Posts in the Humor Category

I just got back from Search Engine Strategies New York—more on the conference later—and had a fascinating encounter there.

What happened was I decided to check out the exhibit halls (they had two).  As I looped around a large booth, a well-dressed man standing in the aisle said, “Excuse me, sir. Are you a webmaster?”.  He had the kind of smooth English-Australian accent so favored of infomercial hosts and lower-grade movie villains.  I admitted that I was, and he informed me he represented an online casino firm that was looking for “revenue partners”.  He was very keen to sign me up so I could start making money.

That’s right: I was being spammed in person.

I was so stunned, I could only tell him I wasn’t interested and walk away, shaking my head.  It wasn’t until later that it occurred to me that I should have gotten his contact information and then passed it on to Jonas.

• Spam, Part Two was published on Thursday, March 3rd, 2005.
• It was assigned to the Humor category.
• There have been eleven replies.

I recently started receiving, for no readily apparent reason, bloated HTML e-mail from Dakota Air Parts, whose site is as lovely as their unsolicited e-mail tactics.  Anyway, I noticed that the mail was coming from what appeared to be a single human, and given that the message also included their 701 area code phone numbers, mailing address, and so on, I could reasonably go ahead and respond with a removal request.  I sort of had to, since there wasn’t a dedicated address for unsubscribe requests.

So off went my response, stating that I’d never asked for the mail and would like to stop receiving it pronto.  Not a few minutes later, I received a new message.  Here’s how it started out:

K.C. here,

I'm protecting myself from receiving junk mail.

Just this once, click on the link below so I can receive your emails.
You won't have to do this again.

http://spamarrest.com...

So in order to stop receiving junk mail from K.C., I had to prove that my mail to him wasn’t junk.

Ah… the sweet, sweet taste of irony, mixed with bold hints of utter cluelessness.  So delicious.

• Spam, Part One was published on Thursday, March 3rd, 2005.
• It was assigned to the Humor category.
• There have been twelve replies.

See, that’s why presentational class names are such a bad idea.

• Keep Your Classes Clean was published on Wednesday, February 23rd, 2005.
• It was assigned to the (X)HTML, CSS, Humor, and Standards categories.
• There have been eleven replies.

While watching a movie on TV this evening—all right, it was Volcano on the apparently mis-named cable channel American Movie Classics—I was amused to discover that the “bad” words had been edited from the audio track, but left completely intact in the closed captioning.  What, is there some kind of assumption that being hard of hearing also makes one hard to offend?

• Uncensored Caption Text was published on Friday, January 14th, 2005.
• It was assigned to the Humor category.
• There have been sixteen replies.

So how long before this gets turned into a boycott campaign by the high-morals crowd?  Because, after all, Target is clearly promoting a homosexual lifestyle by offering this item.  (And just in case they’ve deleted it by the time you read this, here’s a screenshot for your delectation.)

A few quick observations:

• Only $35.96!  And that’s 10% off!  Plus you qualify for free shipping!
• The downside, so to speak, is that it won’t be available for another 4-8 weeks.
• At least it’s been correctly placed in the “Entertainment” section.
• “no picture available” — that might well be a good thing.
• Under “Features”, it says ” See description for information.”; under “Description, it says “See features for information.”

Thanks to Alex Kadis for passing this along.  Er, so to speak.

• Target’s Backdoor Sale was published on Monday, November 22nd, 2004.
• It was assigned to the Humor category.
• There have been thirty-six replies.

Over the last two days, some… odd pictures of the President and his new appointees have made the rounds.  Here they are:

I could use some cheering up, so if you’d like to help out, write funny captions for one or both pictures.  Extra credit for captions that don’t make sex jokes.  (Anything really foul will be deleted.  You have been warned.)

For those who wish to contribute two captions, I think we’ll be daringly original and refer to the first picture (of Bush and Rice) as #1, and the second (of Bush and Spellings) as #2.  Got it?  Great.  Knock yourselves out.

• Caption Hunt was published on Wednesday, November 17th, 2004.
• It was assigned to the Humor and Politics categories.
• There have been sixty-nine replies.

Back on September 10th, liberal Tom Toles published a political cartoon equating the hurricanes pummeling Florida this season with a message from God regarding the 2000 election.  Now, thanks to Photo Matt, I’ve now laid eyes on a map that kind of makes the joke seem more real.  Assuming the storm tracks and election results charted there are accurate, and from what little information I’ve been able to gather they appear to be, that’s kind of… spooky.  Hey, if God does indeed have a presence in this world, you’d think he would have dominion over the course of hurricanes; given that, you have to wonder if maybe he’s trying to tell us something.

Especially since the prediction about Ivan turning west is actually coming true.  Having dissipated over the continental United States, the low-pressure remnants of Ivan have managed to get all the way back to the Gulf of Mexico and are re-forming into a tropical storm.  Ivan is currently projected to bring flooding to Louisiana and Texas.  Seriously.

Hmmm…..

(All right, all right, if we must be serious about this, here’s the Snopes rebuttal.  But please note the categories for this post.)

• It’s A Sign! It’s A Sign! was published on Thursday, September 23rd, 2004.
• It was assigned to the Humor and Politics categories.
• There have been four replies.

Last night meyerweb passed a milestone of sorts: comment number one thousand was posted to the site.  The millenial comment, which was made on the post “Photo Hunt“, was:

Simon! Spell my name right! Have some respect for us poor muggles!

Congratulations to Min Jung Kim—who, in filling out the comment form for that very same comment, mistyped the URL of her own site.  Love the irony!  Love it!

• A Millenial Mark was published on Wednesday, September 22nd, 2004.
• It was assigned to the Humor category.
• There have been no replies.