Check It Out

Remember those creepy dolls from when we were kids that would cry if you shook them, or leak water from their crotch when you stomped on them?

Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about; maybe you didn’t have to abuse your dolls to get them to work properly, but my cousins and I always had the generic knock-off dolls, and they required very strict parenting in order to live up to their full potential. Anyway, remember those dolls? Looking back, you probably think they were pretty creepy. Well, in the words of that song by a group apparently called Bachman-Turner Overdrive (Thank you, Google) b-b-b-baby, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!

I submit for your examination, Exhibit A:

This is a set of plush dolls that you can apparently buy in Japan, and on Amazon when they’re not sold out. They come as a set and retail for $40-50. In other words, that’s some fancy shit. Can you imagine being tucked into bed with these when you were a kid? This is an example of where potty-training by positive reinforcement has gone WAY too far.

Get ready, because Exhibit B is a very disturbing image, imho:

From China (or perhaps Japan again, I’m not so good at identifying the characters) we have another appallingly misguided attempt at a body-function educational toy. I’m not even sure where to start on this one. It’s a baby, growing pubic hair and some kind of funky ankle hair. I wonder if it’s a one-time use toy, or if you can yank its hair to make it grow and shave it all off again, like that Barbie whose hair you could yank and cut to the tune of four feet.

The jury will now direct its attention to Exhibit C:

I’m not sure what this toy is actually called, because I can’t read Japanese, but it’s basically a game of Russian Roulette, except instead of a bullet, plastic feet come out and kick you in the head. Needless to say, if this happens, you lose. I guess if you buy this game, being kicked in the head is the only reasonable course to take from there, anyway.

Exhibit D at least deserves an honorable mention for the concept:

At first glance, this is any old beach ball with a vaguely creepy religious message emblazoned across it, kind of like the lame favors they give out at Vacation Bible School (because when I think vacation, I for sure think Bible!) The thing that strikes me is that it’s a beach ball. Are kids supposed to think they’ll be able to walk on water while they play with this? I hope they test it in the shallows first.

And now Exhibit E, for your consideration:

This toy is called “Sixfinger”, and it is apparently supposed to look like a finger that can write like a pen, shoot missles, and who knows what else. I don’t really understand why this toy finger does all these things, but I can tell you, looking at this picture, a finger wasn’t the first thing that came (ha) into my head. Tell me I’m not the only one, here.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, please view Exhibit F:

I present to you: Facebank! Yep, that’s what this is supposed to be. A bank. Look, I was never a very brave kid, I’ll admit, but I can’t be the only one who would have been completely terrified to stick my hand in this thing’s mouth. I’m not sure I want to know what you have to do to the thing to get your money back out of it? I hope it doesn’t involve the Sixfinger.

And at last, we have Exhibit G:

That is not a real cat. It is a toy robot cat. It has been programmed to act like a real cat, except without the puking and hating you. It purrs and rolls over, and just generally looks at you in a creepy, dead-eyed way. They have a version on toy shelves here called “Fur real” friends, and let me tell you, walking past a toy aisle and having that thing reach a paw for you is seriously creepy.

That’s all for today, but I saw so many creepy toys that I may have to return to this topic some other Wednesday.

What’s the creepiest toy you ever saw/owned?

Also, side note: If anyone knows how to make it so that I can align text and images side-by-side without having the next paragraph of text ride up to be alongside the first picture, please let me know! I tried for so long to make my comments next to the images, but the text and images wouldn’t stay lined up the way they did in my preview.

I’m totally stealing this blog topic from SillyJaime, but really… who doesn’t love Fridays? Well, people who work Saturdays, I suppose, but I’m not one of them so… on with the blogging!

I LOVE… my new pretty plaid blog layout, made especially for me by the one and only SillyJaime. Thanks, darling! <3

I LOVE… playing drunken Rock Band. Looking forard to that tonight with the sexiest lady in town!

I LOVE… Dunkin’ Donuts. I think, if I could get caffeine via IV, I would totally do it.

I LOVE… 6pm.com! I just discovered this site, and I seriously got four pairs of designer shoes for about 90 percent off!! I paid $45 including shipping, and they retailed for over $350.

I LOVE… shopping. Looking forward to doing a bit of that this weekend, too. Look out, Providence Place Mall… I am going to violate you for your bargains.

I LOVE… re-reading the entire Harry Potter series from start to finish. I can’t wait to see what things I find that I never noticed before, especially since, even though I read the third book no less than fifteen times when I was a teenager, I’ve only read the last one once.

I LOVE… that I’m going on a cruise to Bermuda in 55 days. There’s a fun game I like to play on cruise ships, and it’s called “Let’s try not to be sober at all for the entire week.”

I LOVE… my boyfriend, for putting up with my snappy, bitchy attitude whenever I’m writing… or just woke up… or am trying to go to sleep… or am just generally involved in anything at all, really.

<3 That’s all for today. Tell me what you LOVE. <3

You’ve probably heard of fanfiction. You might be an avid fan, a fanfiction writer, or you might just have a vague impression that there are people on the internet that write something called a Snarry Lemon. (That would be a fanfiction in which Harry Potter and Severus Snape engage in some highly controversial wand-work, iykwim, for those of you lucky enough not to know). Those of us that were geeks in high school (read: me) might have thought we’d seen everything in the world of fanfiction, and are now far too jaded to be surprised by anything. Those of us (read: me again) would be wrong.

Apparently, there exists a faction of people that have taken to writing fanfiction about the Bible. On fanfiction.net, the leading site for — guess what? — fanfiction, there are currently2,822 archived Bible fanfiction stories. I couldn’t let such an absurd thing go uninvestigated, and since I found out about Bible fanfiction on a Tuesday, it kind of seemed like I was fated to write a WTF blog about it. In light of this obviously divine intervention (cheap shot) I’m going to have to post my observations.

Two things catch my eye right off the bat: Nineteen of the Bible fanfictions on ff.n are listed as “Crossovers”, which, for those of you that actually had a life before graduating high school, means that it’s a fanfiction about both the Bible and some other fanfiction genre. Let’s take a look at what categories these fanfictions (or fics, as they will henceforth be referred to as) cross over into.

Two of them cross over into the Harry Potter fandom, two into Star Wars, two into Star Trek, one into True Blood, one one into… wait for it…. DC Superheroes?! The rest are things I’ve never heard of, or that at least seem to have something in common with the Bible. Allright, DC Superheroes crossover: I’ll bite.

Hm. Admittedly I can’t figure oout what the plot of this 929-word fanfiction is. Suffice it to say, the second line contains the word “hogolorphic”. I’m pretty sure they mean holographic, but maybe this is some kind of new-fangled Bible fanfiction word I don’t know about.

Let’s move on to the second thing that catches my eye on the front page: 109 of the Bible fanfictions are rated M(ature). Generally speaking, this means there’s graphic sex in the story. Sometimes the rating is set for violence, but it’s fairly unusual for a rating to be set higher than T(een) for violence alone. But I won’t prejudge: let’s see what we can find.

In a story called The Darkness is Golden by fanfiction author The Mad Hattress, we are warned right in the summary that there are “slash implications, heavy Raphael abuse” between the angel Raphael and the demon Asmodus. Obviously, I had to check this out, but I must say I’m disappointed. I only see “fingernails digging into [sic]fresh” and a peck on the cheek. Allright, so the level of M-rated content was disappointing, but wait! Reviewer Oracular Echo writes, “You’ve inspired me to write Bible fanfiction!”. So something good has come out of this after all, right? What the world needs is DEFINITELY more M-rated Bible fanfiction.

Next case study: I think this one speaks for itself. It’s called Hot Steamy Yaoi by fanfic writer Ch3rry1010, and it contains the line “Then we had hot 3-way sex with a dog”. Well, that’s something, anyway. It appears even Bible fanfiction adheres to general theme of most fanfiction.

Let’s take a look at one more. The Untold Gospel Story by PokerGuy has a disclaimer right in the first line of the story. Most fanfiction writers take this opportunity to advise the reader that the characters contained within the story are not the intellectual product of the fanfiction writer. PokerGuy tells us, “Devout Christians might not appreciate this take on the Gospel story.” Yep, I’m definitely going to take the bait on this one. It basically consists of Judas having sex with Mary, getting her pregnant, and staging an angelic revelation to Joseph about immaculate conception. Here’s the stunning conclusion: “Ten months later, she said ‘Be more careful this time. I think we got away with one virgin birth, but more would be hard to explain.’ He pulled out in time, and she helped him finish with her hand. Both knew that it was a sin, but nowhere near as hard to explain as another virgin birth.”

Okay. That last one actually made me laugh. Is that what Bible fanfiction is about, then? Is it all parody? Nah, only the M-rated ones, but the lower-rated ones I saw all had summaries somewhere along the lines of “Kill the atheists because they are unbelievers and need to accept Jesus as their personal savior blah blah blah”. And I don’t really want to get angry, not after reading a fanfiction about Mary giving Judas a hand job. (Were they even alive at the same time? I’m no Bible aficionado, but I was pretty sure Judas would have to be like, three, if he was even alive at all, at the time that Mary got pregnant. That adds a disturbing undertone to the story, that’s for sure.)

That’s about all I can stand to read, and my lunch break is almost over anyway. I’ve begun the descent, at any rate, adn now you’re aware of yet another creepy/distrubing thing you can find on the internet, in case you get bored of googling pictures of mutant sheep with human faces. My work here is done.

I encourage you to make your own explorations on this topic. Tell me what you find!

There’s an assortment of interesting pictures I’ve collected that I want to share, but I couldn’t think of a blog theme to tie them all together, except “random picture blog”… so here they are:

My rescued cat, Ragamuffin, of my old myspace blog fame.

He's like, "Bitch get me a chicken sandwich. And some catnip. FO' FREE!"

Last one, ISTG I'm not a crazy cat lady. Although since I'm pretty much an atheist, I guess that's sort of an empty oath.

This is my first tattoo. I got it a little over 2 years ago, and I still haven't gotten my next one. Which will be a polar bear, if you're wondering. The meaning of my ink is "I like it, therefore I want a picture of it on my body. Permanently."

Jaime and I actually did make butterbeer, in case you were wondering about that. It met mixed reviews. I'm still working on perfecting the recipe.

Anyone who watches food porn - uhm, Food Network - will understand why this is funny. Seriously, once they cast that girl they should have elected to make it a RADIO show. (Disclaimer: not my pic, found it on the net)

Love this kid. Love the commercial. The pony one is good, too.

I'm thinking of trying to market this bumper sticker to like, the National Pea Farmers' Association, or something. I am a sucker for bad puns.

I can't wait to go on another cruise! I think the towel animals are my second favorite part, after the ceaseless alcohol consumption.

We totally have this book at the library. How could they not have seen what that looks like?!

Recognize the island in the picture? You should, it's from the Corona commercials... and I've been there. It's actually called Isla Pasion and it's just off the coast of Cozumel, Mexico. The weird thing was, there was an open bar on the island and they were serving Dos Equis.

Snowmageddon. Blizzardgate. Plain old Bullshit.

Whatever you call it, we were all expecting a monster of a storm in New England yesterday, and we got it… if you call half an inch of snow “it”.

Because the folks that manage the webpages for each of the local news stations are obviously better at their jobs than the meteorologists are, the snow prediction maps from yesterday morning are no longer available online. Since you’re reading my blog, you’re going to have to trust my memory on this one: According to WHDH, we were supposed to get 8-12 inches in Worcester and 12-15+ south of Worcester. WBZ had Worcester pegged for 5-8 and south of the city at 8-14″, and Fox was calling for 4-8″ in Worcester and 8-12″ to the Connecticut border.

They all picked a pretty wide range. 4-8″? I always aim for classy, so let’s use the ever-amusing penis size analogy. Wouldn’t you REALLY like to know which end of the spectrum to be expecting? And yet, allowing themselves the margin of error between a sock puppet and a porn star, they still managed to completely miss the mark by, oh, say, another porn star.

I don’t have hard data because I’m too lazy to obtain any information that doesn’t appear on the first page of Google results, but if I had to throw out a percentage to indicate how often the weather predictions I see on TV actually turn out to be reasonably close to what actually happens, I’d give them 60%. That’s not even a passing grade in public school! You could flip a quarter every day that’s cloudy and below 32 degrees and probably come up almost as accurate as them.

I know the weather’s variable and unpredictable and all that, and yeah, I am aware that I’m living in New England, but with all the millions of dollars put into weather predicting technology can’t they do a little better? They make obscene amounts of money, and they’re hyped up on TV like they’re the supreme, all-knowing gods of weather.

Just cut the crap, please. Stop paying these meteorologists millions of dollars to tell you what any old geezer with a metal hip will tell you.

Here’s my take on the forecast maps for yesterday:

Sorry, DC.

What better to write about on WTF Wednesday than the downhill evolution (devolution?) of a creepy doll?

There are a lot of people that are worried about the effect that Barbie dolls might have on the body image issues and self-esteem of little girls. By now, we all know that Barbie would have to be 7′2″ to have the same proportions as a human that she owns as a doll, and there are many who are disturbed by her eternally plastic grin and those feet that are bent into the shape of high heels.

Personally, I think the stick-thin celebrities and glossy magazine covers that scream “YOU NEED TO LOSE WEIGHT NOW, FATTY MCUGLYPANTS!” are far more damaging, but regardless of where you stand on the Barbie issue, there’s a new bad girl in town. Move over, Barbie – Bratz has you beat in triplicate.

The original Bratz doll was worrying enough in its own right. Here’s an image of one of the first Bratz dolls to hit the market:
Remember being worried about Barbie being too thin? This doll’s waist is literally the same size around as her WRIST. Really healthy. Never mind the fact that her legs are twice as long as they should be for her torso size, and her lips are larger than her breasts. She’s also presumably school-age judging by the backpack she carries, and I don’t think any parent really wants their school-age girl going out in five-inch (comparably) platform heels and showing the majority of her midsection.

I’m one of the last people that will ever say we should be censoring the world from children, but I do find these dolls disturbing. Let’s take a look at those shoes. Have you ever seen shoes like that in the real world that weren’t on stage? Don’t get me wrong here, I like Vegas strippers and all the footwear the image entails, but not for little girls, please?

The thing is, it gets worse. This is a sampling of what I saw in the stores at Christmas time:

Let’s not even mention the weird body proportions, since we already covered that with the regular Bratz Dolls. What I think is creepy here is that these are obviously supposed to be babies and toddlers, as evidenced by their accessories. (Unless, of course, they’re trying to tell you that it’s fine for an older girl to ride in a stroller and carry around a baby bottle, which is possibly even weirder than what they ARE propagating.) I don’t know about you, but I am disturbed by the idea of babies wearing eyeshadow and lipstick.

And as for the Bratz Babyz (Ugh, and they blame the internet for the shitty way kids spell these days? At least the internet has spell-checking built into most sites) wedding set… Can’t we just let kids be kids without shoving relationships and marriage down their throats from the second they come out of the womb?

Now, I do give kids credit. I seriously doubt that most kids are going to look at a Bratz doll and say “Oh no, I’m ugly, my eyes aren’t the size of my fists!” but it is one more block in the foundation we’re laying for children. What are they supposed to think, when magazine covers feature Lindsay Lohan photoshopped into having the same garish proportions as their lipstick-wearing dolls?

Thoughts?

Welcome to the first installment of my new weekly blog feature, WTF Wednesdays. Today we’re going to start with a guessing game.

So, can you guess what this is a picture of?

If you guessed that it’s a close-up image of a Pocket Rocket Personal Vibrator….

… you’re wrong! The picture is actually a new cosmetics product from Olay. It’s supposed to smooth out eye wrinkles. Don’t believe me?

Here’s the new Olay product:

Really, Olay? Really? I don’t care what they’re calling it, I’m writing it off as the first time I’ve seen a vibrator commercial on basic cable.

’cause if I did, I couldn’t be having a Harry Potter themed sleepover this weekend.

Yeah, that’s right. I’m almost 24 years old and I am totally having a Harry Potter themed weekend. Jaime is coming up to my corner of MA from RI Saturday morning and then the geekiness will commence.

She’s going to be making and posting a vlog about the weekend, and hopefully under her guidance I’ll post my first vlog, too.

I should warn you though, things might get pretty intense. You see, Jaime is a Gryffindor girl at heart, and I’m definitely more of a Slytherin. I can’t help it, I’m just devious and ambitious like that. Plus, I’m kind of a chickenshit, which doesn’t really fly with that “brave and daring” bit.

Anyway, Quidditch-related brawls aside (ha), on the agenda we have: watching all 6 currently released HP movies in a row, making butterbeer, and baking brownies and then cleverly diguising them as Cauldron Cakes.

I know it’s completely nerdy and more than a little childish, and I also DON’T GIVE A HIPPOGRIFF’S ASS, because I love Harry Potter and I’m not ashamed. Kiss my green-and-silver clad ass if you have a problem with it!

Oh, and we will also be enjoying the fine musical talents of Harry and the Potters and Draco and the Malfoys \m/

10. Frivolous lawsuits, like the guy that sued an entire town’s small businesses claiming they weren’t handicapped accessible, even though he hadn’t actually visited all of the businesses he was suing, and it turns out most of them WERE handicapped accessible.

9. People who don’t pick up their dogs’ shit, like my next-door-neighbors. If you want to own a dog, you have to clean up its poop, okay? I do NOT own a dog, because I do NOT want to clean up its poop. So why do I still have to clean up dog poop off my walkway again?

8. People who pay for their groceries with a welfare card, but have a brand-new Escalade with spinning rims or a lowered Nissan Z. (I’m talking about you, half the population of Webster!)

7. Children under 12 that define themselves as part of a certain religion. You’re not even old enough to understand what youre religion stands for, let alone all of the terrible things your religion has almost undoubtedly caused people to do. I’m not actually mad AT the children, though, I’m mad at their parents for brainwashing them.

6. Buying something at a store that says “Returns must be in the condition they were bought in”, and then as soon as you get it home, it breaks and you can’t return it, because now it’s not in the same condition it was purchased in.

5. The taboo against swearing. They’re just fucking words, it’s the meanings that people associate with them that can be hurtful, and if I’m not applying one of those words in a hurtful way against you, then what’s your fucking problem? If my car won’t start I’m going to say “This fucking blows!”, and if you tell me I can’t, I’ll say “This seriously displeases me,” and then I’ll punch you in the face. For not letting me vent properly. GRR.

4. The fact that churches are tax-exempt organizations, even though we supposedly have a separation of church and state, and the Catholic church has more money than any other person or organization in the world. I realize it costs a lot of money to cover up all those sexual abuse scandals, but surely they can start paying their share of taxes now that the country’s economy is in such dire straits?

3. Stubbing my toe. ‘Nuff said.

2. People who abuse the ADA and get money from the government because they “had difficulty with … keeping track of money and bills, preparing meals, doing light housework… and using the telephone” Seriously? I never do hosuework and I misdial the telephone all the time. Do I get money now? I am all for helping those who truly need it, but I’ve known so many people who get disability checks that clearly could be working. Being lazy is not a disability. If it was, I’d never have to work again.

And finally, the number 1 thing that pisses me off:

1. Being woken up on the mornings when I could actually sleep in by some asshole telemarketer, even though I’m clearly on the Do Not Call List. Apparently, it is OK for a company with whom you already do business to call you at all hours of the day and try to sell you MORE stuff. If I wanted Charter Telephone, I would have it already, and I would NOT have called you at 7:30 in the morning to order it!!

So… what pisses YOU off? Venting is therapeutic, you know!

So most of us have a pretty decent idea of when something we say or do is generally socially acceptable or not, right? For example, you wouldn’t normally walk up to a stranger and punch them in the face, or flip your neighborhood sexy librarian the bird, would you? (Your answer to that one better be no, or I’ll walk up to you and punch you in the face.)

So what do you do when someone else completely flouts those rules, and leaves you in a position where you have to react to something you’re not sure how to handle?

Today I went out to lunch, and I had just such an experience at the restaurant. I had just receieved my plate with a grilled cheese sandwich and french fries (I love the Kids’ Menu. I will never stop ordering the under-12 specials. NEVER!) when this elderly woman, who has been sitting kitty-corner from me, but whom I haven’t been paying much attention to, comes out of the bathroom. She takes her seat again, and all of a sudden starts talking to me. Now, I’m a pretty friendly person, so naturally I answered.

She said, “Boy, that looks good. What is it?” Now, most people can identify a grilled cheese sandwich and french fries in a single glance, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt. “It’s a grilled cheese sandwich with french fries,” I said. I didn’t even talk with my mouth full, because I am polite and aware of social etiquette like that.

“It sure looks good,” she repeated, “Can I have some?” And then her hand started reaching for my plate. Bear in mind I have never seen this woman in my life, AND she had just come out of a public bathroom!

“Uhm,” I managed intelligently, “No.”

I sort of thought she was kidding, because she looked like a perfectly respectable, slightly awkward elderly lady — you know, the kind that always asks you how school was, even when you’re twenty-three?

“Oh come on,” the lady said, inching her fingers closer to my plate, “I just want a few. No, just one. Just that little french fry right there. Can I take it?”

“Uhm, no,” I repeated, certain I could still hear the toilet flushing behind me. “Come on,” the woman said again, “You’re really not gonna let me have a french fry?”

When I shook my head again, she finally gave up, and decided to amuse herself by asking the waitress for more sugar packets, which she then proceeded to stuff into her pockets.

The worst part was when I had about ten french fries left and I was totally full, and I had to force myself to eat those last 10 french fries, because I totally knew the lady would call me out for not sharing otherwise.

The whole amusing episode made me think, though. Generally, there are accepted responses to all sorts of situations, but what do you do when a situation comes up that you’re not prepared for? How do you handle someone else’s faux pas? Normally, I just roll with it, but when it comes to someone wanting to put their fingers in my food, I totally have to draw the line!

Now share with me (ha)! Have you ever had to deal with with someone else’s total lack of comprehension of what’s socially acceptable and what’s not? What did you do?