Techno-foiled again! Not surprisingly, I returned to 2,000+ Comment and Trackback Spams, which I have been dealing with ever since my return.

More details later, but right now, I am headed for The Deck to join the Usual Suspects for some standing around in the pool and drinking swimming and hanging out.

I will be away for the rest of the week on business. I will again be bringing Mr. Laptop (hereinafter, the “Damned Thing”) with me. Given that my past experiences trying to deal with the Damned Thing have been a disaster, one might say I have perseverance. However, it is probably more accurate to say that my dragging the Damned Thing along yet again demonstrates beyond any doubt whatsoever that learning often simply does not take place.

So, what are the chances that I will be able to post something? Let’s run the numbers, shall we?

1/100 = probability that I will be able to connect to the web with the Damned Thing. We’ll call that “a”.

1/10 = probability that, even if I can connect to the web with the Damned Thing, I will have time to write anything. We’ll call that “b”.

1/10 = probability that, even if I can connect to the web with the Damned Thing and that I will have time to write something, I will have something some content worth writing. We’ll call that “c”.

(a)(b)(c) = probability of “a” and “b” and “c” all occurring.

(1/100)(1/10)(1/10) = 1/10,000

Ergo, the probability that you will see anything new here over the next couple days is nothing on which I would bet the ranch.

How often have you had the feeling that everything in life is moving too damned fast? Too many things to think about? Too many things to do?

Slow down!!!

That was my voter number in my voting district today in New Jersey’s primary election for Governor. When I finally voted (Unfortunately, I was the “on-the-job training case” for the “poll ladies”), the polls had already been open for 45 minutes.

Given that Corzine is running unopposed in the Democrat primary, it is logical to assume that whatever turnout there is will be mainly made up of Republicans. In my voting district, all the Republicans would probably fit in a phone booth. My guess is that the poll ladies got to spend a good deal of time chatting and eating donuts today.

So, in short order (the polls close at 8PM), we should know which candidate will face Jon Corzine (the “Jersey Zilch”) in November. I wish I could get stoked about a possible Republican victory in the general election, but for too many years I have seen the Democrat Machine crush Republicans in this state. The political system is simply rotten to the core.

Maybe this year will be different. Hope springs eternal.

Today marks the 61st anniversary of D-Day.

I cannot help but wonder how many people living in the United States today even know what the historic event is that we have come to refer to simply as “D-Day”.

I cannot help but wonder, of those who do know of the historic event, how many realized that today is the anniversary of D-Day.

I cannot help but wonder, of those who knew that today is the anniversary of D-Day, how many took a moment to reflect on the immeasurable sacrifice, and in thousands of cases, the ultimate sacrifice, that was made by Americans and members of the Allied Forces on the beaches of Normandy that day and in France in the ensuing days and months, the result of which was the defeat of tyranny in Europe.

I cannot help but wonder how the world would be today if they had failed.

I am, however, certain of one thing. We can never properly thank those who took part.

All we can do is promise never to forget them and what they accomplished on that day.

I so promise.

Yesterday, during my morning walk, I encountered a total of eleven people. By “encountered,” I am referring to people who were on the same side of the street as I was and who were walking in the opposite direction.

Of the eleven people I encountered, NINE of them were talking on call phones while walking. Now, this was a Saturday morning, and from the smatterings of conversation I could hear before, during and after our brief encounter, none of them appeared to be a businessperson discussing business, unless, of course, you define “business” as an enterprise involving the wearing a ski mask and a using a gun, or the sale of narcotics, in which case, at least three of them fit the bill.

For a few minutes, I thought that the number of blabbers might only be eight, until I got closer to a woman blabber to see that she was blabbing into one of things that’s welded to your ear, enabling hands-free blabbing during all of one’s waking hours.

I found myself wondering what in Christ’s name was so important that it required these people to be blabbing while walking down the street on a Saturday morning. Then I figured that it must be that certain people have “free weekend minutes,” and maybe that’s what was going on, the mindset being that, if something is “free,” I want mine, and I want a lot of it — sort of like the “free government cheese” debacle years ago.

Call me insensitive, but I could not help but wonder how many of the cell phone blabber-walkers are currently receiving welfare. I would like to think that none of them are, but I’ve lived here long enough to have serious doubts about that.

Saturday morning, hands-free, blabber-walking. It’s a great country.

As many of you know, I am not a food swashbuckler. My tastes are decidedly pedestrian. For instance, seafood is not my thing, and I prefer beef well done. I admit it. I’m really a pot roast and mashed potato sorta guy.

However, I do like Thai food.

Tonight, we went to a local Thai restaurant with a couple of the Usual Suspects, the Original Bill and the Quietly Sinister Linda. After an appetizer of beef satay and chicken satay (which is marinated beef or marinated chicken cooked on a wooden skewer, and served with peanut sauce for dipping), I had beef cooked (stir fried, I assume) with chili peppers, basil, string beans and a bunch of other spices. Add a bit of rice and a couple dollops of ass-kicking hot pepper sauce and you got some good eatin’ – and spicy enough to kick your sweat glands into overdrive.

For dessert (like I need dessert), we had fried ice cream. It comes from the kitchen looking a bit like a dirty tennis ball sitting in a pool of wonderful raspberry sauce. The waitress then dumps flaming brandy on the “tennis ball”. When the flames go out, you slice into the brown orb and see that it is full of delicious ice cream. Yowza!

The meal was great, but the best part is, of course, enjoying it with good friends.

Gott-damned civilized, that.

It’s getting late, and I am without content. Truth is, even if I had something worth a damn in mind, I’m too ragged out to do the heavy lifting necessary to write it out.

Fortunately, my friend Brian the Air Force Vet, came through with an e-mail that purports to contain “extracts from actual High School essays in which students were asked to use analogies and metaphors.”

I truly wonder whether these came from high school kids, or from the mind of someone who can write some pretty funny stuff. Either way, some of them made me laugh out loud.

Here they are:

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.

18. Even in his last years, Grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

19. Shots rang out, as shots are known to do.

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

Velociman has delivered the final chapter of the Blog Western, and has provided us all with a writing lesson. Can this be the same guy who can be amused for inordinate lengths of time by a toy monkey that plays the cymbals?

I saw this at Cousin Jack’s place. Funny stuff. If the Blogoshpere existed back then, Cliff Clavin would have had a wireless connection.