Oh...the wonderfulness. Hopefully my evil plans can come to fruition. Meanwhile, I'm just dreaming.
Cryptically yours,
HJ
Author Archive for BingPage 2 of 41
Seriously. I would love for a certain fellow visiting a certain city to have the sales of his home-school crap completely thrown off. I would love for him to never return to that certain city ever again because it is not profitable.
Oh...the wonderfulness. Hopefully my evil plans can come to fruition. Meanwhile, I'm just dreaming.
Cryptically yours,
HJ
Oh...the wonderfulness. Hopefully my evil plans can come to fruition. Meanwhile, I'm just dreaming.
Cryptically yours,
HJ
You can't have that many quacks on one site by accident. I think that idiots seek them out to publish because the quality of the editorials is so completely shitty.
Take for instance today's...mega....epic...fail...of the century. Holy shit, it is...awful and bad and rotten and retarded. It's a cosmetic dentist who is scared of fluoridation. Seriously, you fuckwit? Really? And you are allowed to touch people professionally? Jeezis.
I liked Animala's quip when she saw it:
"It's interesting that he's a cosmetic dentist. Isn't that like taking a cosmetic surgeon's advice for treating breast cancer?"
Why, yes it is, Animala. Yes, it is.
Let's talk about water fluoridation this week. And, being that I'm a dentist, you'll probably be a little surprised by my stance on it. At least in terms of it being included in water.To be fair, he never claimed that he was a good dentist.
As you likely know, fluoride is a chemical that is commonly found in most toothpaste brands. People use fluoridated toothpaste as a means to strengthen teeth (i.e. prevent cavities) and normally don't think much further about it. Which is fine -- that's pretty much how it's marketed.
And it does, even in minuscule doses.
Since the late 1990s, the United States Food and Drug Administration has made it mandatory for toothpastes to carry a warning in regards to fluoride usage. But why would the FDA post a warning on a toothpaste ingredient?
So mouth breathers like yourself don't go scarfing the gallons that you would need in order to hurt yourselves?
Doing research on what fluoride is reveals that the chemical is now considered a potential toxic drug, and ingesting enough of the ingredient could be harmful.
ANYTHING is potentially harmful in the right doses! And yes, if you take "enough" of something to harm you, it could harm you.
Now, I don't want to scare you
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!
-- brushing your teeth with fluoride toothpaste isn't harmful. Nor is a dentist using a gel-type fluoride treatment when you get your checkup. Uses like that are topical usages -- you don't ingest it. And even if you do ingest some toothpaste (etc), the levels of fluoride aren't going to pose any threat. And it does prevent cavities.
But in terms of it being added to water, I'm not so sure that's a good thing. Adding fluoride has been a standard in many countries for years. However, several countries (mainly Europe) have taken an active stance on banning fluoride from their drinking water. And I'm with them -- I do not see the good in fluoridating our drinking water. I definitely see the reasoning why countries would add it -- it helps prevent cavities. But as a dentist, I think cavity prevention can be done just as effectively without putting fluoride in our water.
Would that entail going to more cosmetic dentists? I merely ask.
To me, the "bad" it can (potentially) do outweighs the good.So what is the bad?
Fluoridation positively correlates with Huffington Post fuckwittery.
Sigh. Long day.
HJ
I have a pair of facebook accounts. One for me, one for Bing. Except for occasional cleaning purposes, I never check Bing's account. Today was one of those rare days, and last month, someone calling themselves "Maxine Wilson" sent me an email:
Maxine WilsonAnd it just cuts off there. Apparently her head exploded. Heehee. Lindy...animal rights activist..hm. Sounds familiar... Oh, that odious raccoon-fucking clown with a neck that looks like Yoda's ass, Lindy Green? I remember her! What's that old granola-snorting goat been up to? Decline, obviously.
Hey Bing!
Sounds like you share a commonality with your spokesperson. You both forage for grub, you both drink incessently, and you both have a relentless urge for sex. Why should your life be any less valuable than the one who disparages it? Furthermore, it appears you both are equally unemployable.
Bing, do you blog on Facebook? Your mouthpiece does. Is this a worthy feat? I would say not any worthier a feat than your zoning out on your lily pad. Bing, pay no attention to this asshole, much less the asshole who dreams of cheetos-shitting cats when he falls into his drunken stuper. OMG, do I sound like an ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVIST? I am. Is Lindy my spokesperson? You bet! Sounds like you two assholes think you have dominion over Bing because you walk upright. And yet one of you is so sloshed he can't even crawl, most likely confined to his pad. i
Her message is almost incoherent, as you can see. (Hey, DM! I think I found a possible fuck buddy for you!) I enjoyed it very much. What have you been up to? Clearly not watching as many kitten-crushing fetish videos as I have. This totally made my day. Thanks, Lindy! As always, every time an animal rights nutter contacts me, I name a steak and have it for dinner. Yum! Tonight I shall eat Little Tina.
Bing's last known photo. Very Silence of the Lambs.
HJ
Seriously, you don't expect to not get home until 10:30 when you step out of the door at 6:30. Well, not if you're me, and I am.
And as things go, it was not a very exciting day. I mean, I showed up to my office, had a bagel, and got to work on designing documents for today's class (drawing up worksheets and suchlike). Then I decided to make myself scarce for a bit. I needed some "me" time. Snicked off to the library to surf the webbies, handle some email, and then just sort of drooled over some guitar pedals for a while.
Soon, class came, and it was time to put on what I call "The Bing Show." Today, we were teaching students how to do a very brief presentation with main points distilled from other work that they had done in preparation for poster presentations. One class was swell, the other, not so much.
Between classes, my colleague mentioned that a couple of people from the department were meeting up. I had forgotten about this, and I got all tense and nervous. I'm very set in my ways, you see, and variation from my routine is disturbing. I need a few minutes to get used to the idea that my day (as I imagined it, at least) was over and that I was going to end up doing things I had not anticipated. I hate changing mental gears like that; they always grind.
Anyway, I went out to a new bar and had a lovely time, honestly. I came across a new word "mouthfeel," which is a made up word if I ever encountered one. It's like some jackass trying to find some aspect of beer tasting that nobody had yet discovered. I bet when he (you know it was a guy) came up with "mouthfeel," beer snobs all over the world celebrated the pushing the boundaries of...evaluating things in their mouths. Yeah, guys, you can have a big mouthful of "weenielick."
So, I got curious about this travesty of a word and went to the OED to see if it was there. I'll be damned. There is is:
The way an item of food or drink feels in the mouth, esp. a sensation of consistency, richness, etc., produced during tasting.
Seriously, if something is in your mouth, aren't you by necessity tasting it? Just saying. The examples they give are just as foppish:
1973 N.Y. Times 26 Aug. III. 12/2 The key to no-drip ice cream..is a new ‘stabilizer’ that ‘does not affect quality, texture, taste or mouth feel’.1995 Fine Cooking Feb. 22/1 Fat..moistens sandwiches.., gives a tender richness to meats,..and it adds richness, texture, and great ‘mouth-feel’ to desserts.2000 Wine May 29 A superb wine, with integrated oak and a vivid mouthfeel following an elegant opening.
A few things. In 1973, when "mouth feel" was pulled out of someone's butt, it seems to have been an advertising word. At least, that is how I am reading the quotation marks. So, yes, vapid non-word conveying almost a sense of a thing. In 1995, when you would have thought we'd have grown out of this mouth feel phase, they still had to put it in "this is not really a word" quotes. The 2000 entry conveys no information. It's superb. So what. What does integrated oak taste like? And a vivid mouthfeel following an elegant opening. NO content there. You have said, almost, "I liked it," only pretentiously.
Anyway, while I was at the bar, I got quizzed over my atheism, and the nice people decided that I was really an agnostic. Sure. I'd get into right now, but the whole mouthfeel thing has left a taste in my mouth.
HJ
Also, who cares?
And what's the point?
"But it has been decided that actually the mosques are facing Somalia or Kenya, so we are now suggesting people shift the direction slightly to the north-west," the head of the MUI, Cholil Ridwan, told Reuters. "There's no need to knock down mosques,
just shift your direction slightly during prayer."
Ridwan said Muslims need not fear that their prayers have been wasted because they were facing the wrong way.
"Their prayers will still be heard by Allah," he said.
I mean, if it doesn't matter...why does it matter? God, religion is goofy. HOLY FUCK! THEY HAVE BEEN PRAYING TO PIRATES!
HJ
Once, when I was in college, I slept through the final exam. It was an essay exam for a lit class I needed for my major. And when I realized that I had totally and completely fucked myself, I met it with a rather detached sense of amazement that someone could do such a thing. That it was me did not enter into it. I had already completely and totally accepted...whatever fate wanted to do to me. I think that is about where I am with my article. I'll work on it a little tomorrow, but I've decided that I will not give much more time to it. One final revision, and then I change course. It has to be that way.
I am currently reading Mistakes Were Made by Tavris and Aronson. It's a charming little book about cognitive dissonance; Tim Farley (who runs What's the Harm?) recommended it to me after my talk the other day. Of course, I am now second guessing every memory I have ever had, thank you very much. I tell you, it's strange but I am applying what I have been reading there over the last few days to my reaction to the sinking realization that my article may not be as awesome as I thought. I've even been looking to blame the people who have been reviewing it, a big self-deluding no-no. It's a damned hard thing to keep focused on the reality of the situation, but worth the effort, I keep telling myself. (See that? Turning a failure into a positive! Let's hear it for reducing dissonance! Yay! Sigh!)
HJ
Holy shit, I can't look at this article anymore. I've written and rewritten it for over a year, it's still not published and holy ever-loving fuck I can't believe the evisceration that I am finding on it after passing it on to my roommate. It's like all she said was, "This doesn't fit" or "This makes no sense." I'm experienced at this sort of thing--I've been critiqued as a writer since...always. But I find it very hard to believe that I could write something so bad and not see the badness. It's agonizing because I want to publish it. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I need someone else to read it. If it comes back with the same "WTF?" throughout, then I'll toss it down the well, and I'll have to swallow it. FUCK.
Also, DOUBLE FUCK!
FUCK!
FUCK!
I wish I could step back and deal with this article in a dispassionate problem-solver, but Jesus, it's been mercilessly hacked and rejiggered for a year, and I don't think it makes more sense now than it did before. When the original reviewers got it, one liked it as it was and said it was "potentially seminal" in the field. The editor agreed in her cover letter. This was a HUGE high. But the more I've reworked it, the more tepid the response has been.
Fuck.
HJ
The infection of nanorobots injected into my prefrontal cortex by the CIA demand that I write about the week that was weak. And, boy, was it weak.
STOP THE PRESSES! MEGA CONSPIRACY OF THE (PREVIOUS) WEEK!
This just came through, and so it's fair game. Sen. Vitter (R-LA) endorses thoroughly debunked conspiracy theory. I WANT TO SEE VITTER'S FUCKING BIRTH CERTIFICATE!!!!!1112@@1!EMPHASIS!!! This is bad news. Really bad.
- From Dr. Theo, in one of the Dakotas (does it really matter which?): "NASA a launching pad for Islam." The strategic collaboration that would get the Middle East excited about science instead of superstition and secularize it (maybe) seems to evade him. Dude, Muslims can't go to space. How do you pray at Mecca from orbit?
- Cupcakes and assassinations at the new Sixth-Floor Museum. That's wrong; murder shouldn't have a gift shop.
- Right Side News: All the News That Isn't!
- From the BIN, "Soldiers moving families away from the Gulf! SEE!?! SEE!?!"
- CNN, WTF? I can't believe you hired this goat-fucking child molester.
- GLENN MILLER TORTURED BY NAZIS IN BROTHEL! No shit? Dude, that's totally how I want to go.
- Can you actually say that people like conspiracy theories?
- There is a "black mamba" snake in our government. Oh, redneck racist! You and your witty quips!
- A minor point in this story that depresses me, Roy Blunt of Missouri, in whose Capitol Hill office I once sat (one of the few reps I actually saw), did not laugh outright at the brither conspiracy. Jesus.
- Artificial fog may have brought down Polish president's plane, in much the same way I fart confetti.
- Man, retards should not be in charge of curricula. Glenn Beck grotesquely overestimates own intelligence, value as human being.
- Wow. Chuck Colson thinks he can speak English.
- Canada: Be polite and not fascist.
- This one reminds me of the old Onion headline (see the lead story).
- Here's one from Jolly Old England that I had not heard.
- This conspiracy theory is not anything new--NWO, Obama, BP, Constitution, Rothschilds, Federal Reserve, blahblahblah--but it has a great picture of Obama that really should be painted on velvet. There may be a unicorn behind him.
- In Dealey Plaza, vendor-murder-leech-creatures evicted. Asshat sues.
- The Lateline report on the New South Wales Health Care Complaints Commission ruling that smashed the nuts of the Australian Vaccination Network. My upside-down friends must be doing little Australian jigs on their hands right now.
- Michael Moriority is a racist. An asshole and a racist. But at least he's unbalanced and unprincipled.
- Hey, how about that neo-Nazi wackjobby keeping America safe from brown people?
- Alex Jones headline bespeaks not at all thoroughly deranged thought processes: America Stands on the Precipice of Total Collapse
I do so love this one.
- Queen Elizabeth so ashamed by the BP oil spill that she plans to abdicate this month.
That's it for now. I should mention that I have been posting this to the "conspiracy theory" page of reddit on a weekly basis, but now the service no longer recognizes me or lets me post. Conspiracy?
Also, I have a recent talk that I gave about conspiracy theories coming out in a few days, so watch for that.
HJ
It was a great episode of Weirdview Weekend. I mean, holy crap. I can't wait to do a review of this episode on my podcast. Sorry. Just had to emote for a second.
You'll hear about this one. It's pretty fab.
HJ
This one has to do with the BP oil well cap that was placed and seems to have stopped the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, an ongoing disaster since April. It's hard to believe that we could finally be at the end of this beginning of this disaster.
While I think that BP seems to have had an inordinate and improper influence on media coverage of the event, how skeptical should we be? A lot of people with a lot more immediately at stake than I have in the well's closing refuse to believe that the well is capped. Their doubt is understandable, but is it justified?
Well, we have BP's word, which is basically worthless. They have been weasels throughout, and I have no intention of taking what they have to say at face value. But we have other evidence, visual evidence of the cap. For what the conspiracy-minded to be true, those pictures would have to be faked or altered. (There are versions of the story where weak pressure at the point of the cap would signify that there was damage elsewhere in the line, but there are no pictures one way or the other to speak to that.)
Here's one shot. It shows only the slightest alteration, probably to bring out the colors of the rig in the murky water. And another shows similar slight, slight alteration.
While I have every reason to have no faith in BP's emergency management technology, I'm not seeing any reason to doubt that the cap is on and working right now.
HJ
This is so wrong, I'm not even going to post it here. Only link to it.
Does anyone have any Chapstick?
HJ
I need to apologize for my lack of posts. This happens occasionally. But I'll have you know that I am working on something that I intend to share with you in the near future, so know that, as ever, I am slaving away for you, the little people! Heheh.
So here is a spoon bending video from A Bit of Fry and Laurie:
Hugh Laurie's song about America:
And, Stephen Fry, what an instrument!
HJ
Do you want to see the least insightful thing ever? I was looking up the exact coordinates of the Deepwater Horizon for a presentation that I am putting together.
HJ
The artist currently known as Prince is a loon. Once known for his progressive use of gyrating hotties, now he is railing against the Intertubbies:
"All these computers and digital gadgets are no good. They just fill your head with numbers and that can't be good for you."*blink blink*
HJ
For reasons I am not at liberty to divulge, I was at a junior high school today with a group of my students. It's a highly innovative school in what I understand to be a socioeconomically depressed area. Black kids. Entirely, I think. 85 of them.
"He killed children."
Throughout the school there are pictures of African-Americans who have made their mark on society. Inspirational. Seriously, I was impressed. These faces were plastered on t-shirts worn by the teachers. But there was one guy who was wearing a Nat Turner t-shirt. Turner is looking, uh, better than he does in contemporary depictions of him (but those were clearly drawn to exaggerate the "African" features of the 1830s Osama bin Laden--he was that hated and detested--broad nose, large lips, etc). Because there is no reliable image of him, the image on this shirt was necessarily an idealization, and he was drawn as a freaking superhero. A strapping guy who was ripped enough to make even the most butch hetero male feel all giggly. And Turner has an axe.
I'm sorry, but we know that I'm a complete prick.
"So, Nat Turner?" I said to the guy.
"Yep!"
"I taught about him last semester."
"Oh, yeah?"
"You know how that turned out, right?"
"With them hanging him. Yeah."
"But you know, before, during the insurrection."
"Yeah."
What I wanted to say was that he had, to my eye, all the markings of a cult leader exploiting a vulnerable population. (The only qualification that I would have is that he was not, to my knowledge, brutalizing the slaves, even if he did lead them on to their deaths.) But I did not want to get into that. I had this in mind:
On which, armed with a hatchet, and accompanied by Will, I entered my master's chamber, it being dark, I could not give a death blow, the hatchet glanced from his head, he sprang from the bed and called his wife, it was his last word, Will laid him dead, with a blow of his axe, and Mrs. Travis shared the same fate, as she lay in bed. The murder of this family, five in number, was the work of a moment , not one of them awoke; there was a little infant sleeping in a cradle, that was forgotten, until we had left the house and gone some distance, when Henry and Will returned and killed it [...].
Killed the slave owners. I think that there is a self-defense argument that could be made there. Went back to kill an infant in bed. How can you justify that? In my mind a line was crossed, and not an ambiguous one. You don't kill people because they might do something bad to you one day. Also, he massacred all but one of the children in a school, the only difference between the victims and the kids playing around us today was that the kids in Virginia were born of slave holding parents.
He was well aware of this, he led me to understand. "But a role model?" I explained that I taught about Turner as a person who occupies an ambiguous place in history.
What followed was a short discussion with a man who put Turner in the same category as Martin Luther King, Jr., who is traditionally depicted wielding a machete and a pistol. Oh wait, hang on...
Anyway, he was a genuinely nice guy, and when he started mentioning people displayed on the murals in the building, I shifted my conversation to the important stuff that they were doing. I did like the guy. I heaped genuine praise on the school and their program.
So what do you think? Nat Turner a hero? Ambiguous? Villain who had a shitty life?
HJ
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