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Sep26

In Honor

Posted By Mark on Sep 26, 2007

Reposted From: http://commentsfromleftfield.com/2007/09/in-honor OATH OF ENLISTMENT I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God. This is the oath that all members of the military must take upon being accepted as a soldier, a sailor, a marine, or an airman. You raise your right hand, and you repeat it following a dictation by a superior officer. I’ve taken this oath twice, and the words still hold a special meaning for me. They mean that you understand that there is something greater than your own individual existence, and that you will lay down that existence for the sake of the United States of America. Your allegiance to the President and those officers appointed over you is a mark of your fidelity, while the dedication to the UCMJ is an affirmation of your dedication to professionalism. Many Americans have taken this oath. Many Americans currently work and fight under the principles embodied in these words. In today’s time of war, this is done under the shadow of death. For these men and women, they are not celebrities, you will most likely never hear most of their names. Movies will not be made about them, nor books written. Often times their job is thankless, and sometimes, they don’t return home alive. But there are two names you will become familiar with, two men who took this oath and have perished exemplifying the ideals of service in the United States Military. Their courage both on the battlefield and in the public consciousness should never be forgotten. Sgt. Yance T. Gray Graduating from a class of just eighteen students, Yance T. Gray hailed from Eastern Montana and was one of only five in his graduating class to enlist in the military. An avid hunter and player on his high school basketball team, "Tell" as close friends and family called him would marry his girlfriend Jessica and father a baby daughter. Working his way through the ranks, Sgt. Gray was a member of the 82nd Airborne division, and his tour of duty was scheduled to end in November. Sgt. Omar Mora In seemingly another world, Texas City, Texas, Omar Mora graduated from La Marque High School. Unlike Tell, Omar had tried several jobs on the outside and college before enlisting in...

Sep25

Reasons To Buy Tickets

Posted By Mark on Sep 25, 2007

Last night I bought some tickets to go and see the Victorian Christmas exhibition at Portsmouth Dockyard later this year. I’m not telling you merely to boast. Nor am I hinting that you should come along too. Heavens forbid! The thought of you in your clothes with your smells and the way your eye does that thing! Urgh! Keep away! No, my informing you of ticket purchasing is simply the disappointing build-up to an even more disappointing climax of a rather disappointing update. I’ll continue. But prepare to be disappointed. There are many ways in which tickets could have been purchased for the aforementioned event. The utilisation of Mr Graham Bell’s wired voice transmittal invention – the so-called "telephonatron" – was one option. However, I am not a fan of that particular communication device. It is prone to occasional feedback and sometimes I can hear my own voice echoing back to me, a most distasteful experience since it seems I do not sound half as manly as I sometimes like to imagine. Alternatively, a visit in person to the ticket booth could have been performed. But that would have required beastly acts such as "moving" and "putting on clothes" and my inner sloth would not have been pleased. Instead I opted for the wonders of the online booking system. I am no novice when it comes to online ordering. Indeed, I order – and I want to use the technical term here – one hell of a lot of crap online. Filling in order forms has become like second nature. In some ways that’s a shame because my prior second nature of walking without hitting walls has suffered as a result. My poor nose. Last night, however, while in mid-ordering frenzy, I was unexpectedly stopped in my tracks by the presence of a question on the online form. Questions such as "How many adult tickets do you want?" and "Do you promise not to smuggle in a chameleon?" no longer warrant so much as a moment’s pause before completion. In this instance, though, I was stopped by: "Why do you want to buy these tickets?" I. Became. Confused. In the end I responded in the writing space with: "Because stealing is wrong." I’ve had time to consider alternative answers though. Me want tickets. I was a teenage Victorian. That’s how capitalism works you commie, pinko ordering form. What? I have a form-filling compulsion. Please make it stop! Help! You will not accept my fan-dancing barter offer. I guarantee it. Victorian Christmas? Oh no! I wanted to see the King Charles Spaniels On Ice Spectacular! The last time I tried...

Sep18

The Media Versus The Patriots

Posted By Mark on Sep 18, 2007

There is a land across the sea; a vast land with occasionally vast people in it. It is the land where everyone is assumed innocent until proven guilty by enforced public opinion. It is the land where spying on citizens, intercepting their emails, tapping their phones, and quite possibly inserting cameras in ceiling tiles above every toilet cubicle in the country to stamp out forbidden consensual acts of homolove is all accepted with little more than a whimper from the seated masses, their representatives in power, and the media who feed them their daily dose of Things We Tell You To Think®. Americaland. So what’s making the news in Americaland these days? The New England Patriots were caught doing something illegal during a recent football game. The New England Patriots cheated. The New England Patriots’ reputation is shredded. The New England Patriots spoilt Christmas for little Jimmy. The New England Patriots were working in league with Osama all along. Really? Apparently so. If you listen to the media. Which you shouldn’t. Ever. What Did The New England Patriots Actually Do? The Patriots used a video camera to record the play-calling of their opponents – The Mangini Nancyboys out of New Jersey – from the sideline during the game. This is against the rules. Bad Patriots. Naughty Patriots. What’s not against the rules is: using a camera to record the play calling of opponents from booths at the ends of the field or on the 50-yard line (which everyone does), taking still photographs, printing, and writing on them (which everyone does), using binoculars to spy on your opponents and making notes about plays (which everyone does), just looking across at the opposing bench and field and writing down what you see (which everyone does), employing players who use their ears to listen to opposing calls, their eyes to see what the opposing team does, their brains to remember what happened, and their mouths to mention this to their teammates and coaches (which everyone does), asking new members of former teams about the play calls of their previous employers (which everyone does), sacrificing chickens and examining their entrails to identify defensive formations long in advance (which the Arizona Cardinals do to awesome effect!) The video camera-taping by the Patriots did not provide a direct feed into heads-up displays in the helmets of the team. Head Coach Bill Belichick does not have a cybernetic implant that allows him to tune into video camera feeds wirelessly. He does have cybernetic implants. Just not that one. The Patriots broke a rule for the convenience of taking notes. Yes they did. Not for cheating. Getting...

Sep12

My Most Miraculous Marmot

Posted By Mark on Sep 12, 2007

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, animals that comprehend the human tongue, and gypsies too: roll up, roll up, one and all, pin back your ears and strain your eyes to see this wonder of nature captured for your pleasure and perusal. Prepare yourself to gasp in awe. Those with a weak constitution or those prone to experiencing vapours at a moment’s notice must sit themselves down upon a sturdy surface now or leave at once. I give you Montgomery, a Most Miraculous Marmot! Perhaps, even, the Most Miraculous Marmot put upon God’s green Earth by God hisself. I do not make such claims lightly and I implore you to vacate these premises post haste should you find yourself coming over faint in the coming minutes. For you who stay – and I applaud your vigour – listen well, for you will want to tell your friends and family later what you learn right now. Forget all you know or think you know about marmots. Montgomery is no ordinary marmot. You sir! You with the hat! Tell the ladies and gentlemen here where you obtain your marmots! A loud and clear voice if you please. The Alps? A very fine locale for finding marmots indeed. In my many years of marmoteering I have encountered many wonderful marmots from that area of the world. But let me assure you that even should you uproot your family and move permanently into the European mountains thenceforth committing yourself to trapping and examining every marmot for a period no less than double the rest of your natural life – yes, double – then I would wager all the marmot-pelts in Peru you would not come across so fine a beast as Montgomery here. A hush please. Look at this marmot. Now think: what could be so miraculous about this marmot? What terrifying secret lies behind its buck teeth? Does it, perchance, burrow through brickwork and lie in wait within your boudoir when you retire at night? Ushers, please! The lady with a peacock feather in her hat near the aisle appears to have taken a turn for the worse. I’m sorry to have frightened you all. Let me tell you now: this Most Miraculous Marmot does not await you when you return home! No, that is the purview of the Horribly Horrific Horseshoe Crab! And rapists. I shall allay your fears further, gathered folk. Montgomery, my Most Miraculous Marmot, is not the reincarnation of His Royal Highness Prince Albert. Should I pause to allow those of a swooning nature to swoon? No? Then I shall continue. In addition to not being royalty reborn...

Sep08

Bin Laden Tells US To Convert

Posted By Mark on Sep 8, 2007

US officials today who wished to remain anonymous confirmed that they believe the speaker on a newly-released al Qaeda video was indeed Osama bin Laden. In the video, which was released to the web near the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America, bin Laden urges America to convert to the metric system in order to prevent more trauma and bloodshed in the world. Transcripts of the video, aired on al-Jazeera TV and obtained by several media organisations in the US, indicate that the speaker made no direct calls for attacks on America for the first time, but he did hint at boycotting the lucrative exports market. Instead, he goads the American people for holding onto a measurement system at odds with the rest of the planet. "Do you know who is still using the Imperial unit? I ask you! Do you know? I did a search on Wikipedia and it turns out it’s you, Myanmar, and Liberia. Myanmar and Liberia? Seriously, what? "While it’s nice that you could visit Myanmar and Liberia and not be confused by a system that doesn’t rely on multiplying everything by fourteens, sixteens, and Allah knows what else in order to calculate anything I sincerely doubt you even know where Liberia or Myanmar are. "Metric, you infidel swine! Come on! Everyone else is doing it!" As well as promoting the sensible decimal-based metric system of weights and lengths bin Laden spends over ten minutes advocating metric time and dates but admits at the conclusion he would be hard-pressed to give up his Rolex. The transcript also makes reference to the fact that bin Laden has tried to amend his Wikipedia entry to indicate he is actually 2.4 metres in height but someone keeps editing it back and when he finds out who it’s Jihad...

Aug31

Rejected TV Sitcoms

Posted By Mark on Aug 31, 2007

If you’ve watched enough television then you’ve probably come to the conclusion that there is no such thing as a rejected television sitcom. With programmes as truly, cringingly, stereotypically awful as The War At Home and genuinely, cry-inside, unfunny as The I.T. Crowd you could be forgiven for thinking that TV producers look only for the words "situation" and "comedy" and greenlight a series without checking for those all-important warning signs such as "written by a racist", "based on a Chekov play", or "starring Tom Arnold". However, in the annals of TV history there actually have been some sitcoms rejected by networks across the world. For the first time, a selection: Pope Jack Synopsis: Father Jack, formerly of Father Ted, becomes Pope. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: There is no latin word for "feck". Chachi Loves Richie Synopsis: A modern take on the Happy Days spin-off penned by Russell T. Davies. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: ABC’s testing indicated that viewers and Ron Howard were uncomfortable with every scene featuring penetrative anal sex. Schindler’s Lisp Synopsis: The everyday tale of a Sudeten-German Catholic businessman in the days of The Final Solution and his struggle to invent a list-processing computer language for the Nazis. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: There was a rival sitcom based on Goebbels and his love affair with Babbage’s Difference Engine already in production. Married … With AIDS Synopsis: Sal, Penny, Burt, and Kerry Grundy battle one another and HIV positive humour at the same time. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: Threats from shoe salesmen – worried that their business would be affected by storylines such as "Sal’s Shoehorn Infects A Fat Woman" – forced the network to pull out. That’s My Janitor! Synopsis: A middle-aged, long-term unemployed man is finally employed as janitor at an all-girls school. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: FOX imposed a limit of fourteen onanism references per episode but the writer would not negotiate down from three hundred and seventy two. How I Raped Your Mother Synopsis: A rape story in reverse, the story follows Todd telling his numerous offspring about the events that led to him serving life with no chance of parole. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: Focus groups indicated they were not keen on the phrase "Your Mother". Mind Your Language A.D. 2100 Synopsis: Updated version of the classic racist comedy set in a language school teaching English to damn foreigners. Now on the moon. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: Nobody was sure what horribly offensive stereotype could be applied to Esperanto-speakers. That ’40s Show Synopsis: Erich von Feuermann and his...