Do you know anything about the Twelfth Imam?

You damned well should.

Youse guys who stop by here and who don’t maintain a blog may not be aware of the constant battle we bloggers wage with comment spammers. Fortunately, blogging software catches most of the comment spam, but when the software can’t figure out whether a particular comment is real or spam, it relegates it to a “moderation queue,” which allows us to check it out and decide whether it will ever see the light of day.

Many of the spam comments are screamingly obvious in that they are from a domain in Russia, and/or they will contain three thousand words of gibberish and thirty links. Other spammers, thinking they are very clever, try to disguise their comments as the real item. The former are easy, and the latter often crack me up with their sheer douchebaggery.

Yesterday I got this comment to a very, very old post:

I can see the logic in your argument but I think you’ve painted your strokes

.
Yo, thanks, Asswipe, but the last time I checked my strokes remain unpainted.

Update: Just got another gem. This one was a comment to a post about Bacon Vodka.

Additional Detail – last time I had problems,it just turned power saver regime,and it didnt shut down upon electricity dissapearal

“Electricity dissapearal” Hilarious.

Today I find myself harboring yet another serious case of the ass. I probably spent too much time watching the news and reading about, as we used to say in school, “current events.”

I watched Chuck Schumer go on and on about how swell the government option socialized medicine will be. Of course, you’ll never run into that weasel-faced prick in the government clinic.

I watched the video of the young animals in Chicago beat a kid to death. (I’m not linking it. It’s easy enough to find, and it’s difficult to watch.) It was positively sickening. I hope they are all caught and are treated like the animals they are. Pieces of shit.

Tomorrow, the Empire State Building will be lit up in red and yellow in honor of the sixtieth anniversary of the communist revolution in China. Yeah, I know; the building is lit up differently for various occasions, but Jesus H. Christ! The anniversary of the communist revolution? The country has gone insane.

Oprah is going with The One and Mrs. The One to Denmark to lobby for holding the Olympics in Chicago. We can’t lose with a powerhouse team like that on the case. Maybe Oprah can give everygoddamnedbody in Denmark a car. Maybe street beatings will be a new event for the Olympics. Chicago has a team ready to go.

I could go on and on, but all I’m doing is pissing myself off even more.

That is all.

OK, we have Iran shooting off missiles that can hit Israel and American bases in the Gulf. We have The One’s Administration, having already seized a major portion of the auto and banking industries, engaging in a full-court press to seize one sixth of the U.S. economy in the name of socialized medicine universal health care, and we have the commander on the ground in Afghanistan (appointed by The One and with whom The One has spoken with one time) asking for more troops.

In some alternate universe perhaps it makes sense that, at this time, The One and his wife will be winging off to Denmark – yes, Den-farookin’-mark — to pitch Chicago as the next Olympic venue.

I got to thinking about other things The One might do while the world crumbles around him, rather than spending just a teeeeeeny bit of time actually doing the job of being the President:

A get-together with Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro and Vladimir Putin to discuss the arrangements for the May Day Celebration next year on the South Lawn.

An audition for a gig with “Dancing with the Stars.” I figure he’s a lock.

A trip to visit Blago to remind him what’s in it for him to keep his fat mouth shut.

The rearranging the sock drawers in the White House.

A trip to England to ask how much the Queen loved the iPod and really loved His speeches.

A meeting with congressional leaders to discuss the government takeover of the fast-food chains in order to allow a Fast-Food Public Option in order to stimulate competition and lower the price of a Big Mac.

A meeting the with the NEA architects to discuss plans for the Barack Hussein Obama Tabernacle and Library.

The videotaping of a reality program entitled, “A Week with the Most Awesome First Family EVER” to be run on the networks in prime time and 24/7 on NPR.

Every day with this guy brings a brand-spanking-new kick in the stindeens. I don’t know how much more of this crap I can take.

Best wishes to my pals of the Jewish persuasion for an easy fast and for lots of Chinese food when it’s over. I believe pizza works too; just hold the pepperoni.

Today I got to be a judge yet again, although it had nothing to do with things legal. As in years past, I was one of the judges on the Truck Rodeo course. This year I was the Left Turn, Right Front Tire Guy.

Here is how my station looked. The idea is that, after completing four previous tasks on the course, the drivers had to make a sharp left turn and come as close to the rubber duck as possible without hitting the duck with the right front tire. You can see the scoring pad on the ground. The score was based on the portion of the scoring pad run over by the tread, not the bulge, of the right front tire. The drivers were not permitted to stop; they had to line this all up while moving from the previous task (which involved making a left turn and rolling the left rear tire over two similar scoring pads) — My buddy, Da Chef of da Future, was the judge for that one.

Here’s a better look at the duck and scoring pad. The duck was equipped with a string so that I could pull it out of harm’s way if it was clearly going to be run over. I had to yank the string three times, but the duck got squished a couple times anyway. I suppose a live duck would be more dramatic, but way too messy.

Here is the boundary within which the drivers had to stay while making the left turn.

The Truck Rodeo includes a fork-lift competition. That was going on to my left.

Here is a driver in a tractor-trailer doing one of the problems at the beginning of the course (Sorry for the bad lighting and lousy picture. I couldn’t leave my spot, and I was using a cell phone camera while the sun was hidden behind a cloud). The drivers had to pull out, swing right and then back in between two barricades, which permitted only five inches on either side of the trailer. These guys are good. I don’t think I could have done as well with my car.

The drivers’ families attend, and there is lots of food, prizes, and games for the kids (e.g. a water balloon toss), a small car show, a dog contest, a hot dog eating contest followed by a pie eating contest.

It’s a rather tiring day, but da Chef of da Future and I do it every year, because our friend Ken, (my bodyguard), is involved in managing the event and because it is a genuine slice of Americana.

These days, we have to protect those slices to keep them from disappearing.

Seeing as how The One seems driven to continue to apologize to tyrants for the evils that America has been perpetrating right up to the day of His inauguration, I think it’s fitting that I offer an apology to the people of the United Kingdom, a staunch ally of the United States.

As one of the 40+ million people in this country who did not vote to elect an arrogant, rude and dismissive empty suit to the Presidency, I would like to apologize to the people of the United Kingdom for The One’s seeming inability to recognize who are our friends and who our enemies should be. Like you, we, as well as the many who voted for him, but now wish they hadn’t, are stuck with him until 2012.

At that time, we hope to send him off to seek other employment.

Note: Fausta also has some thoughts on the matter.

I watch just about zero network television. There is, however, one exception. I often watch Jeopardy. I usually do pretty well, unless the categories include Geography (Damned if I know any rivers in Bulgaria) or the Bible (Mathew, Mark and Jack?). It provides a bit of dinner time brain exercise.

BUT!

The one part of the program that makes my hair hurt is when Alex chats with the contestants. That is some seriously cringeworthy stuff. The following examples are typical:

Alex: Contestant No. 1, Mary Gibbelruth, our grammar school teacher from Denver, Colorado, it says here that you had a frightening experience traveling to Los Angeles to appear on Jeopardy. Tell us about it.

Mary Gibbelruth:Well Alex, my husband and I were in the Denver Airport and we were seated by the gate waiting for the flight, and it was difficult to hear what the airline person at the desk was saying into the microphone.

Alex: Wow, that’s quite something. Did you miss your flight?

Contestant No. 1: No, but it was really weird … are really scary.

Alex: Wow, I’ll say. Now we have Contestant No. 2, Edgar Schmidtbutt, a parking valet from Miami, Florida. Edgar, I understand you have an interesting hobby.

Contestant No. 2: Yes, Alex. I collect coins.

Alex: Ah, a numismatist. Fascinating. How many coins are in your collection?

Contestant No. 2: Three.

Alex: You only have three coins in your collection?

Contestant No. 2: I just started.

Alex: Very interesting. Finally, we have Contestant No. 3, Marilyn Peckwith, a librarian from Little Rock, Arkansas and our current Jeopardy Champion. It says here that you had a bizarre experience on your honeymoon. What happened?

Contestant No. 3: Well, Alex, my husband and I were staying at this really fancy hotel in Bermuda, and we went to the dining room for breakfast. I ordered scrambled eggs and he ordered pancakes. When the waitress brought our breakfast, she gave me the pancakes and him the scrambled eggs. We looked at each other not sure what to do, and I decided to tell the waitress that she gave me his breakfast and gave him my breakfast. The waitress said, “I guess I have to do the switcheroo” and she switched our plates around so that I got my scrambled eggs, and he got his pancakes. It was pretty wild.

Alex: Bizarre, indeed.

It’s farookin’ painful. Can I get an amen?

A recent poll showed that 89.3 percent of those polled believed that the “media played a very or somewhat strong role in helping to elect President Obama….”

What the poll really showed was that 10.7% of those polled are either deaf and blind or have shit between their ears.

Yeah, I do.

I was way busy today with Life 101 (no groundpound, even) and did not give a moment’s thought to what I might write for Mr. Blog. However, a few minutes ago, I had the germ of an idea, which has the promise of being mildly amusing, but I’m just too damned tired to flesh it out.

I guess you (and I) will just have to cool our heels until I am not quite so ragged around the edges.

In the meantime, read Doug Ross. I do – every day, several times per day.