corrigenda

“An article… Saturday incorrectly stated the number of positions possible for the Rubik’s Cube. It is 43,252,003,274,489,856,000.”

the new york times
november 2, 1982

overheard at the upper crust (a pizza franchise)

“…i’d rather have sex with a whac-a-mole machine.”

is this a nascent genre?

bonus: though a fellah said it, the phrase could work just as well for the dames.

digging himself deeper

orson’s girlfriend: how do i look?
my friend orson: super sexy.
og: but i’m going on an interview.
mfo: i mean, you look super professional.
og: well which is it?
mfo: uh, what i mean is…you look like a professional sexworker.

overheard at whole foods this morning

“…he’s so rich, he doesn’t even buy underwear—he just wears his slacks once or twice and then tosses ‘em.”

i knew that i wanted to be a rich bastard for a reason.

get this:

my next door neighbor refers to the usb port on his laptop as his laptop’s cornhole.

deuteronomy 23:1

He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD.

sorry lance armstrong and tom green, no matter how many tours de france that you won or freddy got fingered movies that you starred in, moses sez “no heaven for you!”

other (more graphic/less poetic) translations here.

the hammer

i brought a few friends along to my 95 year-old grandfather’s 95^th birthday party. this is a more or less accurate transcription of their introduction:

raynor: grandpa, i’d like you to meet my friends, doug, orson, and peter.
doug, orson, and peter: nice to meet you, sir.
my 95 year-old grandfather: do you fellahs ever take showers together?
doug, orson, and peter (looking at me nervously): no, sir.
my 95 year-old grandfather: then how do you know which one of you gets to be nicknamed the hammer?

and that is how doug got his nickname.

overheard at au bon pan

“…i’m not familiar with that argument, i’m gonna have to google scholar that.”

the verbification of google scholar has begun!

some couples do dinner and a movie

from an email that i just received (achtung: the word vagina is used):

But overall, life is great.  I’m on my OB/Gyn rotation right now. [My girlfriend] and I are actually on the rotation together, which is quite comical at times. For our first time together in the operating room, we had to shave a woman’s vagina in preparation for surgery.  Let me tell you - that was the worst date we have ever been on.  Some couples do dinner and a movie - we shave vaginas.  On the bright side however, we did a pretty darn good job.

the passenger in 17d

if you ever have the misfortune of inhabiting a confined space with me for any length of time (be it an elevator, a car ride, a sporting event, etc.) you will notice that i have a præternatural ability of carrying on a dialogue entirely in questions. if all goes according to plan, the end result of my salvo of queries is *hopefully* a rare bit of information that small talk between strangers would never normally have elicited.

this was the case with a mustachioed indian man named sachiv who was on my return flight. a summary of our conversation:

raynor: are you visiting boston on business or pleasure?
sachiv: both. i am seeing my girlfriend but am also on business.
r: what do you do?
s: i’m an investment banker.
r: and do you want to be an investment banker for the rest of your life?
s: actually, my father and i have started a company.
r: an investment banking company?
s: no, a production company. we are making a bollywood movie.
r: what is the movie about?
s: it is about a father and his son.
r: what is the plot?
s: (with obvious hesitation) it is about how the father schemes to kill his son so he can marry his son’s girlfriend.
r: who wrote the script?
s: my father.

malaprop du jour

at the pearl s. buck estate today, a father yells to his young daughter (in regard to the peafowl that she is trying to pet): “darling don’t get too close to that peacock, it may try to ravish you.”

now that would be a sight to behold.

what my russian friend (who is learning english) calls baby cows

“look,” he said pointing to two calves, “those veals look very sleepy.”

overheard at the gym

“she’s just poured into those size extra large sweatpants.”

he's got hoes in different area codes

from a friend serving in the peace corps in paraguay:

Maybe a month ago I bought myself a hoe. Actually, just the metal head part because that´s all they sell down here. You have to attach it to a special hard wood handle made out of a specific type of tree. Anyway, I carried it back to my community and went in search of a handle and someone who knew how to make hoes. One of the farmers, Mr. Ariel Rios happened to have extra handles lying around and he offered me one for free. Then he suggested that I ask Victor or Irinaldo to put it together. It´s a simple process—you cut grooves into the end of the handle on either side, make an incision on the very end, and then hammer a wooden wedge, dubbed the ‘kuña’ (which means woman in Guaranì), into the crack to hold it all together. I walked home feeling like how I can only imagine a soldier must feel when he receives his first firearm.

On the walk back to Salomòn’s house, I ran into Rubèn Rodas. Rubèn actually knows some English, but rather than carrying on in conversation,  he mostly enjoys exclaiming in a loud voice ‘I speak in English’ while grinning triumphantly at me. As we neared the small church, about a half a kilometer from my destination, he fearfully jumped in the air and uttered a high pitched cry. I stepped aside and looked down—a small brown snake slithered in the sand. I asked if it was poisonous and he said yes, muy peligroso. We stayed looking at the snake until one of the neighbors came out to see what the excitement was about. At this point the little serpent retreated into the weeds on the edge of the road, but the neighbor grabbed a small tree branch to fish it out of the obscuring grass. He set it down in the middle of the road and then both he and Rubèn urged me to kill it with my new hoe. At first I refused and lamely replied ‘pero es un inocente.’ But they, unsatisfied with my response, reiterated their command, reminding me of the dangers posed by a poisonous snake. So I raised high my brand new implement of peace and struck hard three times. The snake lay dead and the dust rose about it like an exhausted spirit ascending into the heat of the sun.

looks as if it’s weapon day at the ragbag.

what my mom and sister are looking to get

my mom and my kid sister are going to a spa this weekend. they are looking to get facials.