Sorry

Sorry I have been inactive on this blog. Eventually I'll get back around to it.

Oprah - The greatest salesperson of all time!

Oprah recently did a show on the Amazon Kindle reading device. Oprah clamied the device was "life-changing for me". The Big O (sorry Oscar) raved and raved about the Kindle and then announced a $50 coupon code to take the price from $359 to $309 (note: the Kindle is now backordered for 11-13 weeks, coincidence?).

Anyways, my mother-in-law LOVES Oprah. She watches it all the time. She took great interest in the show about the Kindle. It would read to her! She could listen to MP3's! What a great device! So, she bought one. It arrived a week later and she showed it off to me and my wife.

So, Duke, what's the point of the story? Yeah, your mother-in-law watches Oprah and bought a Kindle based on her recommendation. You know, I wonder if Oprah told every woman to jump off a bridge, would they? I'm not sure but it could be a fun experiment. Would they all jump off the same bridge? Would you have to take a number to jump? Would Oprah go first? Oh, sorry, back to the story.

Yada yada yada my mother-in-law got a Kindle. Big deal you say? Well, my mother-in-law has MS. She cannot use her hands at all. In order to use a Kindle you have to use, you guessed it, your hands to change the pages, adjust volume, etc... So Oprah, the P.T. Barnum of the 21st Century, managed to talk my mother-in-law, who has MS, into buying something that she cannot use at all. Nice.

Oprah, if you read this (heck, does anyone read this), please send my mother-in-law $309. And while you're at it, send me a Kindle, they look cool!

THANK YOU!

To: The Citizens of the United States of America

From: Duke Danbury

Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. I am so proud of you. And now I am actually proud to be an American!

I am here to help you make up your mind

I heard that you are one of the many undecided voters for the upcoming Presidential Election. Even though I have already decided and voted (see blog post below) I am going to help you decide. Why am I doing this? I am a nice person. And I also have ABSOLUTELY no idea how anyone can be undecided. It's not like it's between two similar people, for instance George W. Bush and Satan. So below I have listed the issues to help you, the uninformed moron who is actually undecided.

Issue: Abortion.
Obama: Pro-Choice
McCain: Pro-Life
Result - See, they are what we call "opposites"on the issue.

Issue: Health Care
Obama: Mandate that all children have health care. Promotes affordable, accessible and high-quality health care for the rest of us.
McCain: Opposes universal health care, even for kids. Gives you a $5000 tax credit.
Result - How does that $5,000 look when you have a $50,000 bill from your insurance company?

Issue: Iraq War
Obama: Hates It!
McCain: Loves It!
Result: Obama wants your military kid home for the holidays. McCain wants your military kid to not be home ever again maybe.

Issue: Taxes
Obama: Help the lower and middle class, eliminate tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations.
McCain: The rich get richer.
Result: If you're reading this then you probably support Obama. Rich folk don't read this blog. They have someone do it for them. And that someone should vote for Obama.

Issue: National Security
Obama: Voted against the Patriot Act.
McCain: Voted for the Patriot Act a la Bushie Boy.
Result: There is probably someone standing outside my house waiting to whack me over my blog postings.

Issue: Choice for Vice-President:
Obama: Smart Raving and Ranting Lunatic
McCain: Idiot Raving and Ranting Lunatic with OH MY GOD fashionable glasses
Result: Tina Fey would like to retire.

So you see Undecided Voter (that includes Fred the Electrician, Paul the Veternarian, April the Porn Star, Max the Policeman and all the plumbers from Ohio) the two candidates are about as different as you can get on the issues. It's like dog vs cat, big vs small, outside vs inside, night vs day, black vs white.

Oh....now I get it. Shame on you.

Two votes for Palin!!!

Gee, ummm, golly. My wife (Let's call her Hockey Mom With Lipstick) and I, Joe Six-Pack, are moving so we got absentee ballots. We voted this morning for the ever adorable Sarah Palin and her uber fashionable glasses.

Yeah, right.

Finger on WHAT button?

Sarah Palin made her unscripted debut on ABC News this evening, sitting down with ABC News anchor Charlie Gibson for the first of at least three interviews, and she sounded much like a high-school kid trying to shovel his way to 500 words on an essay. Lots of filler and generalities in trying to sound Vice Presidential against the onslaught of a few tough questions from Gibson on Iraq and the Russia/Georgia conflict (she did stick to her laugh-out-loud assertion that because Alaska is next to Russia, that counts as foreign policy experience. As a poster commented on E. J. Dionne's Washington Post blog "Here's a question for Sarah. I live near the ocean, does that make me a marine biologist?")

But hiding in the weeds, so to speak, was a clue, and a telling one, about Sarah Palin. Here was Gibson's question about Iran and Israel and her response (no video of this exchange exists online yet, though it should soon, and italics and phonetic spelling are mine):

GIBSON: Let me turn to Iran. Do you consider a nuclear Iran to be an existential threat to Israel?
PALIN: I believe that under the leadership of Ahmadinejad, nuc-u-lar weapons in the hands of his government are extremely dangerous to everyone on this globe, yes.


Sound familiar? Sure it does. We have a sitting President who has been pronouncing it "nuc-u-lar" for over eight years now. There probably isn't anyone on his staff with the balls to correct him, but you know teacher Laura and the twins have chided W on that white-trash term for as long as he's been saying it that way. Yet, he has never corrected it in subsequent speeches or appearances. Couldn't be bothered. George W. Bush is no idiot, despite seemingly overwhelming evidence to the contrary, but he is stubborn.

You, gentle reader, have certainly made similar pronunciation mistakes in your life and once you realized your error, you have made a mental note to correct yourself, right? I know I have.

Don't you think that among Sarah Palin's handlers there isn't at least one of them who caught that nuc-u-lar boner and said to her "Sarah, that is a lightning rod for them to call you stupid. You have got to fix that!"

Maybe Sarah decided it wasn't that big a deal, or worse, that there was nothing wrong with saying it that way. Maybe she just thinks that it's "folksy."

But I am guessing that Sarah Palin, like the current Worst President Of All Time No Matter How Many Presidents We Have Down the Road, is just stubborn and arrogant.

Hopefully on January 20, 2009, she also won't be a heartbeat away from the Presidency.

I want to work for ESPN

Dear ESPN,

I would very much like to work for your company. I think I could do a good job of writing for your sports department, your anchors or even be the ticker guy. Below you will find a sample of my work that I think you will find satisfactory. I tried to write something that you haven't covered recently, maybe you could include it in your next broadcast? Thanks and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,

Duke Danbury
Self-Righteous Brother #2

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There is no I in stimulus

Woooo! We got our tax stimulus check recently. My wife and I were soooooo excited we didn’t know what to do! First we did a little jig around the kitchen. Since I’m 44, I got tired pretty quickly. So then we yelped and whooped and hollered like we had just stole an election. I mean we got a check from the government for no apparent reason, time to celebrate like it was 1999 (side note: gas price on 7/26/99 = $1.37/gallon, 7/26/08 = $4.30/gallon). But then I found out our dear “President” wanted us to spend this money on things to help stimulate the economy. Oh I get it! Stimulus check, stimulate the economy. Oh Mr. Bush, you are such a cad! My wife and I then sat down to decide what to get. I mean this was a tough decision, here was the United States government giving ME money for a change and I wanted to make sure, as a flag-pin wearing American (er, not) that I spent this money in the correct way to ensure our economy was stimulated.

After careful consideration and thoughts of a 95” flat screen television for the master bathroom or maybe some radical new skates for roller derby (actual purchase, www.howispentmystimulus.com) we decided the best way to spend the money was to…drumroll please….what, the drummer got laid off due to the crappy economy? Damn. Anyways, we decided the best way to honor (Worst)President(Ever) Bush was to….spend it on things he would not approve of!

So, Mr. Bush, here is what we did with our money: Half of it went into my IRA (Note to Bush: an IRA is a retirement account. Maybe when you're done screwing up this country you can go back to school and learn all the things you should have if you weren't in a cocaine induced haze for years. Anyway, I would never give money to Republican terrorists, such as yourself for instance) The other half we donated to charities that I know you would never approve of; I’m sure they all will send you thank you cards soon. Here is the list:

1. Obama for President – Yes, we gave our money to someone that will actually unite this country and make it a better place to live. (www.barackobama.com)
2. The Conservation Fund – We believe in saving our planet, not saving rich people from paying taxes. (www.conservationfund.org)
3. Room To Read (via Good Magazine) – The only story Bush has ever read is The Pet Goat. Although I have never read this story, it must be pretty darn good as he couldn’t put it down even though the USA was under attack. (www.roomtoread.org and www.goodmagazine.com)
4. Freedom From Religion – Pray all you want. Just keep it out of public places, like the ones MY taxes go to. (www.ffrf.org)
5. WXVU Radio (Cincinnati) – The local NPR station. NPR is good. Bush, not so much. (www.wvxu.org)
6. New Stage Collective – This is a wonderful little theatre here in Cincinnati. Meanwhile, our fearless leader keeps trying to cut funds to the National Endowment for the Arts. (www.newstagecollective.com)
7. Save the Animals Foundation – A local animal shelter here in Cincinnati. For some reason I just have a hunch that Bush kicks his dog. (www.staf.org)

It wasn’t easy picking these places, there are so many deserving charities out there. But I thank you for all the hard work you do. And now you can thank President Bush for helping you, which is something I bet you never expected to do.

Why don't thin white males use the drive thru window?

I go to Starbucks a couple times a week on the way to one of my clients. This specific one is in a very suburban area and has a drive thru window. Over time I have noticed the following:

Most of the people who go through the drive thru are:
a) Women
b) on their cellphone (even while ordering, how sad is that?)
c) overweight
d) driving either a SUV or Minivan

Most of the ones (including me) that walk in are men who drive regular or sportier cars or students (both gals and guys). Sure, once in awhile I will see a kid in a VW Bug using the drive thru but it's very rare. And the men that use the drive thru are ALWAYS on the cell phone and driving a gas guzzler (I, for one, will be happy when gas goes to $5/gallon, more room on the road for me).

Sure you're not getting much exercise walking the fifty or so steps to the door but when you're already fat ordering a triple cream venti latte while sitting on your ass doesn't help either.

And for those of you who already hate me for going to the corporate Starbucks instead of the locally owned place (which I normally do with regard to restaurants) let me remind you it's only a friggin' cup of coffee. And I like their coffee and chai's. Sue me.

Hillary's New Strategy

Philadelphia (AP) Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY), stymied again and again in her efforts to overcome her 150-plus delegate deficit in her contentious primary fight against Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL), said today that the race should be decided on the "quintessential American principal of 'age before beauty'."


"We all all familiar with, you know, 'age before beauty,'" Senator Clinton told a somewhat puzzled group of supporters at a suburban Philadelphia high school. "I hold the door for you at a restaurant or the theater, and I say 'age before beauty' and you get to go first, you know? Well, why should this election be any different? It's a good system and it has worked for over two hundred years. My great-great-great-great grandmother wrote in her diary about a young George Washington holding the door for her, you know, and using that phrase, so it goes way back!" When asked to produce that diary, Sen. Clinton demurred, saying that it was a "private matter" between "me and my great-great-great-great-great grandmother."


Clinton went on to say, "Look, I'm no beauty but hey, I'm alright, as the Boss once sang. And Barack, well, he may be inexperienced and not a Muslim, as far as I know, and he may be siding with Reverend Wright, you know, but he is a good-looking man, I have to say! So I have the age, you know, 'cause I'm 61 this year and he isn't even 50, and he's got, you know, the looks, the beauty. So it is an open and shut case, I think."


Clinton added "This election is too important to be left to the vagaries of the delegate count, or the popular vote count, or to the voters. The polls, you know, will back me up."


Today's NBC/Wall Street Journal poll seemed to bear Senator Clinton out; a poll of 1267 likely voters, when asked the question "who deserves to be the Democratic nominee, age or beauty?" chose "age" by a comfortable 61%-36% margin. 70% of voters were able to identify Senator Clinton as the older candidate, and that number shot up to 81% when the respondents were provided the ages of both of she and Obama.

Senator Obama, stumping in Indiana, said in response that "the current Democratic party delegate selection system is working fine and that there seemed no reason to overturn it,"
adding that he agreed that he was "more attractive" than Mrs. Clinton and that he "has it goin' on" but stopped short of characterizing himself as "beautiful."

A Clinton campaign insider, speaking on condition of anonymity, admitted that even if this new strategy works, that the Senator will need to recalibrate in the fall against the then 72-year old presumptive Republican nominee, John McCain. The Clinton operative admitted that the plan then will be to use the "ladies first" strategy. "We think John McCain is a polite man, very old-school, and that he will acquiesce."

McCain was asked about Clinton's fall strategy during a Florida campain stop and replied "Thanks for the question, you little jerk!"

McCain's traveling partner, Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CT) quickly jumped in; "What the Senator meant to say was "We think it's up to the voters to decide."