Well, on my home planet of Neecknaw, this is a simple affair. The new leader chooses himself.

Or herself. But we haven’t had a female leader since the Gloomy Ages (the interstitial period between the Dark Ages and the Time of Light) when the orangutan giantess Slothia sat on the preceding and diminutive warlord, Marmostak the Mighty. (Marmostak the Mighty Small the followers of Slothia called him.)

But you’re probably asking because of the upcoming so-called “elections” you are holding in the “democracies” of the large landmass you call “North America”. I think the political theatre you have invented is quite fine, actually, though it lacks a certain martial élan that we on the Planet Neecknaw like to see in our leadership hopefuls.

So in that spirit, I would like to suggest that in lieu of your “elections”, you should have some kind of television show in which the leaders of your political “parties” eliminate one another in gruesome (and entertaining) ways. Because you humans value guile and low cunning as much as the simian population of Neecknaw, I’d recommend something that compensates for brute strength alone — I’m open to suggestions in the comments. (Otherwise, I’m pretty sure Elizabeth May will have an unfair advantage over the other sissified leaders of Canadian political parties, and this should also make the US election more interesting to watch too, though they are already pretty bloody.)

Next time: In space, nobody can hear you scream, but if an alien is laying eggs in your Captain’s cranium, you still CAN scream, right?

An elimination match will now ensue between humor-blogs.com and alltop. If that is not entertaining enough, may I recommend the Carnival of the Insanities.

Something is starting to smell bad…

It’s nice to see Letterman in good form. (Paul got in a few licks too.)

Update:

Yeah, McCain really rubbed Letterman the wrong way. But who doesn’t get upset when they are blown off and then lied to about why. “We find out today he didn’t really leave (NY) ’till this morning. . . The economy held on just long enough for him to get back there. (Washington, DC).”

More smells at humor-blogs.com and alltop. And more insanity is available at the excellent Carnival of the Insanities.

What do I do? Shouldn’t you be asking what will you do?

What I do is charge up the power cells in my Interstellar Ape-arda, fill the ships with hordes of uber-chimps hungry for adventure and loot, and set course for the nearest planet that hasn’t used up all its resources.

From there, it’s a simple matter of subduing the local sapient population (if there is one), and then setting up shop. Literally. The second major phase of any decent conquest is building the consumer infrastructure you need to plunder a planet. You’d be amazed how many societies are content to live within their means. Sustainable development is no good if you’re in the pillaging business!

Once you have them selling things bought or processed, or buying things sold or processed, or processing things sold or bought, then you’ve got an economy you can sack.

But that’s what I’d do (if I still had a fleet of space ships capable of faster-than-light travel and crammed full of bonobos with a jones for gold-plated walking sticks).

You can barely reach your own planet’s orbit, so you’re going to have to come up with a more creative solution.

Next time: What’s the etiquette when an alien bursts out of your dining companion’s chest? Do you wait for them to excuse themselves, or do you say “God Bless”?

More inexcusable horrors are available at humor-blogs.com and alltop.

It were 2011, and a year had passed since the Le Fromage de Satan had sunk our frigate with an exploding cheese, killing all hands except for meself, Jim Quinn, and the chef’s assistant, Paul Le Whisk.

Arrr!

Le Whisk gave up yer life at sea after his near brush with the Belugas. And I? Well, after the disaster that befell the HMCS Shag Harbour, it were clear to me His Majesty’s fleet was not going to capture the worst of Canada’s curdaneers, Captain Jacques LaBung. It would be up to me to get LaBung and his ruthless gang of cheese pyrates, whose savage bowel obstructions were infamous along the Gold Coast.

So I hit upon the idear of luring them in, so to speak, with me own tempting cheddar. I resigned my commission, and entered the shadowy world of bathtub cheese making. Dangerous work for sure, keeping clear of the authorities while yer curds age, and I almost lost me good hand in the press one time. But soon, I had load of unsanitary cheese, ready to lure LaBung and his plugged-up pyrates with.

I let it be known that I were transporting my salmonella-laced booty that night, and knew the word would get out to LaBung. Even if he suspected its quality, he could never resist a boatload of gold. My launch were a sturdy craft, but it would not survive the explosives I’d put in the hold. Me plan was to destroy the ship when La Bung and his constipated crew came on board.

I were willing to die for me revenge, but it were not to be.

Sure enough, their awful ship, Le Fromage de Satan, came at me as soon as I was in the St. Lawrence, but before they boarded me, a swarm of birds rose from the craft. It were a flock of aggressive parrots, trained by the demon La Bung himself! They came at me, screeching profanities in Quebecois, and pecking at me good eye! They stunk of the ship’s bilge, where La Bung had been keeping them, driving them mad with the reek.

Ashamed as I am to admit it, I panicked, and abandoned me wee launch to the feculent birds.

I dove under the water, and swam away as fast as I could, knowing the pyrates would stop for the cheese, and leave me be.

But I could hear the roar of LaBung’s laughter, above the din of evil parrots, screeching: “Kétaine! Vas te faire foutre!” I vowed (yet again) that revenge would be mine.

Authorities seize “bathtub cheese” | Flock of Houdini birds hits city | Other sources of giggle-guano can be found at humor.blogs.com and alltop.

Arrrr!! Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day! Part one of Cheese Pirates!here.

Welcome to the 105th edition of the Carnival of Satire, now on a monthly schedule. As always, we have a collection of irony-choked posts, parodies and humorous satire for you, beginning with a trip down memory lane to 100-acre woods:

Satire Patch has tracked down the actor who played Piglet, in one of their poignant and entertaining Interviews With The Damned.

Tom Cowan delves into a disturbing new lifestyle trend in the UK: Child Capture.

Madeleine Begun Kane has this Popeye-inspired political ditty: McCains Bellicose Tune

Azelma Petit combines his business acumen and understanding of how to kick ass in The Chuck Norris Guide to Self Motivation

We’re sorry we didn’t get this carnival out before you were able to make use of Rickey Henderson’s helpful The Republican National Convention Drinking Game.

For all you fiction writers out there — worried your characters are two dimensional? A Leahey has 1002 Character Ideas that will ensure it!

julius bloop continues his satire of Gerald, WOW player in: Gerald’s Song (Or: How I Lost My Guild) .

Sammy Benoit at YID With LID has a modest request: Whoopi Goldberg->Please Change Your Name !!.

In our non-satire slot, we have a note of optimism (what, I hear you saying, in the Carnival of Satire?), to share from Brian Jay Stanley: Election Campaigns, Then and Now, and some fine snark from Ron McKie: God bless America.

And that’s it for the 105th edition. Thanks to these fine folks for helping us with webby-stuff: the Blog Carnival for their form; and the listings at the Ubercarnival, Ferdy’s permanent floating ping festival, and for the listings at the Blog Carnival too. Also, you may find some satire here if you poke around a bit. Here too.

The year were 2011 and I joined the Navy for one reason alone — to get me vengeance on Le Fromage de Satan, and her scurvy master, Captain Jacques LaBung.

LaBung and his crew of plugged-up sea-dogs were known all along the Gold Coast — the north shore of the St. Lawrence. The bilge rats were infamous for their cruelty, their addiction to Quebec water-aged cheddar, and their malignant bowel obstructions.

Me own father had been a boson on Le Fromage de Satan; killed by LaBung for some minor offense. Arrr!

They Strapped him to the Wheel. This was the worst fate yer cheese pyrate could suffer, worse even than keel-haulin’. When yer underwater cheddar goes bad, that wheel of cheese is used as an anchor — or in the case of me Da’, he were strapped to it, and tossed over to be Mocked By the Belugas.

Down to Davy Jones he went, and I vowed me revenge. So now here I am, Ensign Jim Quinn, newly minted by His Majesty, and ready to take on the worst of Canada’s curdaneers.

Avast! There she be, heeling out from Baie des Ha! Ha! in full flight. But she’s no match for our frigate, the HMCS Shag Harbour.

And then, the milky whey of fate stepped in, and a fog bank came up to obscure our prey. We had to slow, and we thought we’d lose them, but then we heard them in the fog, laughing at us.

Our captain piled on, and the Shag she responded! We could hear their laughter above the roar of our engines, and then I noticed it in the water.

“Hard a larbord!” cries I, but too late. We hit the cheese-barrel dead-on; I was abaft, and so, were thrown overboard in the blast, not kilt outright.

The bow of the Shag were in flames, and then it began to sink, taking me crew with it. Me captain had been caught by one of the oldest tricks of yer Quebec curdaneer — the exploding cheese.

The flames went out as the Shag Harbour went down, and Le Fromage de Satan disappeared into the fog, the laughter of her pyrates mocking me, me Da, and those few brave seamen who’d survived the wreck.

Mocked me, they might have, but killed me they hadn’t, and vengeance would still be mine. I’ll see you in Davy’s yet, LaBung!

Next time: The Revenge of the Crimson Parrots

Three more sleeps to Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Sunken Quebec Treasure | Photo by fourthirtythree | Other bunged-up bilge-rat humor at humor-blogs.com and alltop. Arrrrrrr!

If you haven’t had a chance to watch “Le Grand Content” yet, I highly recommend the experience. Never mind that the voice-over sounds like a German Stephen Hawking. Never mind that the improper use of Venn Diagrams will send Mr. Hippity into paroxysms of erudition.

The short (just under the new YouTube-mandated attention span of 4 minutes) film is by Clemens Kogler together with Karo Szmit. (Voice by the android-like Andre Tschinder.) According to their write up:

“Le Grand Content examines the omnipresent Powerpoint-culture in search for its philosophical potential. Intersections and diagrams are assembled to form a grand ‘association-chain-massacre’. which challenges itself to answer all questions of the universe and some more. Of course, it totally fails this assignment, but in its failure it still manages to produce some magical nuance and shades between the great topics death, cable tv, emotions and hamsters.”

Yes, you read that correctly. It manages to combine cable TV, emotions and hamsters. But don’t let that put you off. It also has lots of quips on careers, regret and hickeys. And the final take on “the perception of how much alcohol is left” is worth your time.

The film is at YouTube for those of you who can’t see the embedded clip. (Via Edward Champion’s Reluctant Habits):

What there’s more to this post? What kind of pretentious wanker are you?

Well, it is titled, “Le Grand Content O-Rama”. I am a pretentious wanker who likes to make a tawdry display of his reading, so this list of the top 106 books most often marked as “unread” by LibraryThing’s users appealed to me. Normally I’m too lazy to copy these lists and then bold, underline and italicize as necessary. (See.) I guess the premise of this list is that lots of people have books on their shelves to make themselves look smart or well-rounded, though you can argue the point. According to the Wall Street Journal, these “memory rooms” are about creating an ambiance, not reading. One interior designer admitted to “scouring flea markets and bookstores for books with fancy bindings for her clients’ bookshelves. She selects books to match color schemes rather than for their content.” (via Gawker)

I actually don’t own most of the books on this list, though I do have some on my shelf.

Bold the ones you’ve read, underline the ones you read for school, italicize the ones you own and haven’t read or started but didn’t finish. (I’ve also put an asterisk * after the books I have no intention of ever reading/finishing and a † for the ones I have on my shelf.)

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (though the narrative doesn’t live up the quality of its footnotes) †
Anna Karenina
Crime and Punishment
Catch-22 (a must read if you love satire) †
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Wuthering Heights*
The Silmarillion (also not recommended unless you’re a 15-year-old virgin with time to kill)
Life of Pi: a novel (It’s a story about a tiger and a small boy in a lifeboat. And it’s more than two pages long. Impressive.)
The Name of the Rose (major pretentious wanker points for finishing this one.) †
Don Quixote (ditto)
Moby Dick (more information about whale biology than you’ll ever need)
Ulysses (I can’t get past chapter four)
Madame Bovary (she was hot)
The Odyssey (kick-ass adventure story with a mass murdery finish) †
Pride and Prejudice
Jane Eyre
A Tale of Two Cities (”It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times.”)
The Brothers Karamazov (Dostoevsky rocks. Apparently Freud was fascinated by this book too.)
Guns, Germs, and Steel: the fates of human societies (must reading for anyone who creates worlds) †
War and Peace
Vanity Fair
The Time Traveler’s Wife * (this is starred, even though I don’t know anything about this book. It’s the principle. Anything titled “The Something Something’s Wife” would get the dreaded star.)
The Iliad (once you get over the author’s obvious foot fetish, the book is pretty good) †
Emma
The Blind Assassin
The Kite Runner *
Mrs. Dalloway
Great Expectations
American Gods
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Atlas Shrugged (Yeah, I know. Plus, I’ve also read the Fountainhead.)
Reading Lolita in Tehran: a memoir in books *
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlesex
Quicksilver †
Wicked: the life and times of the wicked witch of the West
The Canterbury Tales
The Historian : a novel
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Love in the Time of Cholera
Brave New World (This is probably in my top ten.) †
The Fountainhead (See.)
Foucault’s Pendulum (Baffling until I read Holy Blood, Holy Grail, at which point I got a bit freaked out. Luckily Dan Brown then dumbed it all down enough in the Da Vinci Code that I realized I was being silly.)
Middlemarch
Frankenstein †
The Count of Monte Cristo (Ultimate revenge tale.)
Dracula
A Clockwork Orange (Highly recommended my droogs.)
Anansi Boys
The Once and Future King
The Grapes of Wrath
The Poisonwood Bible: a novel *
1984 †
Angels & Demons (the shame!)
The Inferno
The Satanic Verses *
Sense and Sensibility
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Mansfield Park
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
To the Lighthouse
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Oliver Twist
Gulliver’s Travels (he gets big, he gets small, plus, there’s talking horses.)
Les Misérables
The Corrections
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
Dune (can you imagine what Freud would have made of an entire culture of giant worm-worshipers? Jack-pot.)
The Prince (must reading for anyone going into business, politics or fratricide)
The Sound and the Fury
Angela’s Ashes : a memoir (this is actually quite a funny book, once you get used to reading about crushing poverty, relentless alcoholism and incipient TB.)
The God of Small Things
A People’s History of the United States : 1492-present
Cryptonomicon †
Neverwhere
A Confederacy of Dunces (I have a feeling this one won’t be much read in a generation or so.)
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Dubliners
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (This is the only pretentious Czech book on the list, but believe me, I’ve read dozens.) †
Beloved
Slaughterhouse-five (Also in the top ten.) †
The Scarlet Letter
Eats, Shoots & Leaves
The Mists of Avalon (viking chick-lit!)
Oryx and Crake : a novel
Collapse: how societies choose to fail or succeed (Skip the first chapter and you’ll be fine.) †
Cloud Atlas
The Confusion †
Lolita
Persuasion
Northanger Abbey
The Catcher in the Rye (I read this one every time I start feeling a little alienated from society. It’s almost like I was programmed …) †
On the Road (I agree with whoever said, “that’s not writing, that’s typing.” Tennessee Williams?) †
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Freakonomics: a rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything *
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance : an inquiry into values (You know, I really didn’t see the ending coming, so I have to recommend it. However, it took me the better part of a year to read.)
The Aeneid (Roman propaganda crap.)
Watership Down (An adventure story about rabbits. How cool is that?)
Gravity’s Rainbow
The Hobbit (I’m not sure what I love more, the book or the 1977 made-for-TV animation.) †
In Cold Blood: a true account of a multiple murder and its consequences *
White Teeth
Treasure Island (Arrr!) †
David Copperfield
The Three Musketeers (Hilarious.) †

Now, is it me or is there a lot of SF on this list? What the hell?

This was all started by someone else, but I stumbled across it at Ahistoricality. If you play, I’d love to know about it. My score: Bold (read, unbidden, because I am a pretentious wanker): 51, Italics (read but not finished): 3, Underlined (read in school, which doesn’t necessarily mean I didn’t enjoy them): 5.

More classics at humor-blogs.com and alltop.

Barga had thought he’d seen it all.

I mean, he’d been around a bit, even if he did live in a time when early humans were still experimenting with clothing. The morning had been spent grubbing for truffles and thinking about soup. That afternoon, he decided a pleasant dip at the ‘ol swimmin’ hole would be just the thing. But the serenity of the day was not destined to last.

At least, not much beyond the uncomfortable realization that the human attacking him was hung … well, like a bear, but better, Barga had to admit.

Later, he reflected upon how delicious the one who ran screaming from the glade would have been if the back of his legs hadn’t been so badly stained with early homo sapiens fecal matter …

[From the Toulouse Le Grandfig Necrobiblia Collection]

Humor-blogs.com and Alltop are also experimenting with clothes.

Look out.

It’s CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC), and it’s going to nibble our bums — to infinity!

In just a couple days, CERN is going to turn on its nifty new gadget — the world’s most bitchin’ particle accelerator, which is kind of like a really powerful toy train, except instead of a toy train, the LHC sends two tiny particles of matter hurtling along the track at nearly the speed of light. Yes, it is the ultimate demolition derby! With any luck it will reveal what all that dark matter nonsense is about, give us more information about the origins of the universe, explain why we don’t have any antimatter to power our warp drives, complete Newton’s unfinished work (on mass, not alchemy), and with any luck, give the particle physicists enough to do for a while, so they can stop disturbing my sleep with nightmares about strange quarks and cats that may or may not be dead.

Then again, it could destroy the planet.

I wouldn’t count on that though. There is a really slight chance that the LHC could produce micro-black holes (but they should evaporate almost immediately). If they don’t they’ll eat us alive.

The LHC could also tip us in to a vacuum bubble. This is not what happens when you try to suck up gum with your Hoover. This is an hypothetical state (ironically, more “stable” in terms of physics) in which the Earth would cease to exist. IN layman’s terms, this would be bad.

So too would magnetic monopoles — I won’t even try to pretend what the hell they are — and strange matter. Strange matter is the stuff that is found in your mouth after an evening of drinking peyote and avocado milkshakes. Nasty, yes, but is it enough to cause the end of the universe? CERN thinks no. Personally, I’m hoping a few globs of it land in my brain and give me superpowers. (Particle telekinesis and omniscience would be my choice, but I’d be happy with the ability to read minds or turn all easy listening music into psychotropic mushrooms.)

You may want to read about why humans are fascinated with the end of the world in this BBC story, but I prefer the outline from CERN. The “safety” questions are particularly entertaining.

Now, if all of this wasn’t frightening enough, there is also the Carnival of the Insanities to visit, and more weird quark-filled strangeness at humor-blogs.com and alltop. Thanks to julkastro for the end of the world shot.

Sincerely submitted, Dr. Tundra.

Update: Has the Large Hadron Collider destroyed the Earth yet?

Rozie was a helluva’ dame.

She could sink those rivets faster than a two-dollar fancy-girl could peel the wrapping off a sailor on shore leave, after he’d been at sea for several months, writing bad poetry and extended metaphors that ended up just kind of petering out, the way that an old man with a pipe full of wet monkey fur did, trying to light the mangy stuff with a can full of lima beans instead of a match or a zippo, or the right technology for the job.

Then the propeller cut off her head.

[From the Toulouse Le Grandfig Necrobiblia Collection]

More heroic attempts at comedy here and here.