Saturday, November 28, 2009

Look This Way, Michael

A headline from "The Onion" makes me wonder: Just when WILL the documentary cameramen finish getting all the film they need from "The Office"?

-Old Gargoyle

What Do Those Birds Eat Anyway?

The photographer just left my hospital room. The next time you see my blog's profile photo, I'll be wearing a black eye patch and showing three missing fingers from my left hand.

Do yourself a favor: Don't suddenly decide to try falconry; don't rent a falcon without any training on your part; don't take the falcon, perched on your hand, to an open field.

-Old Gargoyle

Watching the Sky

No snow in Ohio for the first time in all of November in 100 years and no snow at the ski resorts in all of Switzerland, say news reports. I think I'll return to Barney Noble where I saw eight---count 'em---eight new books on the approaching apocalypse in 2012, and buy all of them. Gotta start taking this stuff more seriously.

-Old Gargoyle

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Habeus Corpus

Yesterday I walked to my local park around noon to escape the little woman's nagging. There I sat on a bench with a distinguished looking older gentleman who was eating his lunch and who had a bag of peanuts with him. I quickly recognized him from newspaper photos as City Judge O'Brien. But just as I began to speak to him, we were interrupted by what was on the grass in front of us: two large pigeons---slowly and cautiously, it seemed---approaching O'Brien.

Now I swear that the following is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth: In a high but clear voice one pigeon said, "Permission to approach the bench, Your Honor."

-Old Gargoyle





Monday, November 23, 2009

Money Well Spent

I read that a young guy in Texas spent about $2,000 to buy an old school bus, then spent about $50,000 to renovate it into a football-games tailgate vehicle for him and his beer-drinking buddies. Now that's the kind of imagination I like to see. God bless our football fans! And God bless America!

-Old Gargoyle

Report Card on His Plentitude

God is good---at least to male viewers. He has seen to it that Oprah Winfrey soon will be off the air, at least off network tv; that Kate of "Jon and Kate Plus 8" soon will be gone; and that the underdog New Orleans Saints are undefeated. But God is inconsistent. When will He cause Rosie O'Donnell to disappear from the media? When will He make sure that Sarah Palin (who, blast it, remains as cute as a button) is no longer heard but only seen? Are the latter two too valuable to his cosmic campaign?

-Old Gargoyle

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Guard It Closely

I had to fire Tippi, who lives near Los Angeles, and who's the secretary of my struggling national fan club. I noticed that my credit-card statement was including a monthly "special fee" of $40 from an Internet company. As it turns out, Tippi was responsible for that because of the unusual password she had registered for the fan club with the Internet service. The password she uses is MickeyMinnieDonaldDaffyHueyDeweyLouieSacramento.

"Why the hell that long, extraordinary password?" I asked her.

"Because," she said, "the website instruction said for me to use at least six characters including at least one capital."

Yes, I'll now say it: Tippi is a bleached blond.

-Old Gargoyle

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

A.I. vs. N.S.

I rented and watched the movie from a few years ago, "A.I.," and reached the conclusion that artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.

-Old Gargoyle

Energy Drink

When an exhausted, over-worked vampire goes out in the evening for his feeding, I wonder if he looks for a human with high blood pressure.

-Old Gargoyle

Bathamm

I know you're wondering who should play the lead role in the next Batman movie. I always thought a younger Tom Selleck would've done well as the Bat, but now probably John Hamm of tv's "Mad Men."

-Old Gargoyle

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Sell the Farm

Despite last Sunday's gospel reading and despite such movies as the new "2012," Americans, especially, are simply not prepared for the Apocalypse.

-Old Gargoyle

I Just Can't Win

Okay, so you know I don't like dogs and cats. Not only do I not like them, their status in society baffles me. I read of people being given several YEARS in jail for harming dogs and cats. But I never read of anyone ever arrested for killing frogs, spiders, garden snakes, roaches, ants, mosquitoes, parakeets, etc. What gives? Why not? Maybe these latter animals and insects are not harmed on a large-enough scale, I thought. So I tested my theory. I walked down the blocks of the neighborhood near my farm swirling my large net, slashing my sword through the air, stomping in my hunting boots, screaming and shouting and jabbing at all the frogs, spiders, mosquitoes, ants, and so forth I could see or imagine to see---hundreds of them.

So what happened? At last I was arrested! Thank goodness, I thought, some consistency showing that these creatures were no less important than the barking, crapping, scratching, biting dogs and cats of my neighbors. But no, to my surprise, my arrest was not because I was harming these animals but because I was DISTURBING THE PEACE! I couldn't believe it! My sentence? Assigned to city park for one week to scoop dog and cat crap.

-Old Gargoyle

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Is He Still Alive?

I'm always searching for good traveling music, i.e., c.d.'s which make long-distance driving in my car more pleasant. I think I've found one in the songs of Leon Redbone. Give Leon a try.

-Old Gargoyle

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Are the Bullets Available in Crayon Colors?

In Britain the school children are not armed, but school children in America are. That's just not fair.

-Old Gargoyle

Get a Second Job

Oh my, I've just made a discovery in my New Testament research: Jesus' gospel statement "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven" is an editing error. It should read "If you have to ask how much it costs to enter the kingdom of heaven, you cannot afford it."

-Old Gargoyle

Animal Crackers

In reply to the worried inquiries by readers Chris, Jamie, and Emory about my recent blogs on dogs and birds: No---no animals were harmed in the making of those blogs.

-Old Gargoyle

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Give Them a Bone

As you know, I hate dogs. But I have to tolerate them primarily because "dog" spelled backward is "god," and I think a message is there somewhere for me. Nonetheless, this morning I found a use for dogs, at least for an imaginary one. When a couple of geeky, door-to-door Pentecostal guys rang my doorbell, disturbing my brunch and my beets-and-squash market tv report, I asked them, "Say, do you boys think God will punish me if I unleash my rotweiler on you?" At that point, it made no difference if they answered "yes" or "no."

-Old Gargoyle

Monday, November 9, 2009

2 + 2 = 5 (at Least if God Says So)

I love it as irony and as a continuing sign of the times: My local newspaper, as many others across the nation, recently eliminated its religion editor and weekly religion section while adding a weekly sports "extra" supplement. It's more important to know who has successfully moved a ball across a field or an arena court than it is to know who has successfully or unsuccessfully challenged traditional concepts of God or the established authority of churches. Americans are comforted, I think, by the precision of numbers and rankings.

-Old Gargoyle

Berlinked

Twenty years ago this week the Berlin Wall fell. It was a moving moment, I read, to have seen at that time the East German government bureaucrats tearfully reunited with the West German government bureaucrats.

-Old Gargoyle

Goat Herder

I haven't been able type anything for the past few days because of the restraints on my arms (and legs)---after I was hospitalized---right after I began flashback hallucinations---right after I watched the new George Clooney movie "The Men Who Stare at Goats"---right after I saw on the screen the scenes from the Army's 1960s+ experiments using LSD and other dangerous drugs on some of its soldiers---after I myself had sudden recovered memories of being subjected to these drugs in my Army days---right after I had been captured back then as a draftdodger in the frozen hills of northern Ontario, and dragged back to the states. I just can't win. Yet all is not lost---the current hallucinations are giving me ideas for new comic-book characters which I can sell to some publisher upon release from this institution.

-Old Gargoyle

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Fair-Weather Friends

I awoke this morning to find the cage of my two parakeets, Paraclete and Holy Ghost, empty. Its door was open, and a tiny note with a scrawled message was left behind. The note, "written" by the two, said that they went south for the winter, and that they would see me in the spring. The nerve of those two birdbrains after all I've done for them! They'd better not return with the bird flu. Well, more seed for me to mix with my cereal.

-Old Gargoyle

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Roses Are Red, Blackeyes Are Blue

The little woman made me drive her to our public wildflower gardens. While meandering the gardens' walkways with her, I killed four pesky butterflies in mid-air, and accidentally swallowed two others. Pheeewww---slimy, oily little buggers---they should switch to low-fat margarine---margarineflies. Then she had me smell what are called Delaware roses, which I don't think are real roses. Anyway, their scent caused an immediate allergic reaction in me. Jonka watched me writhing on the ground for fifteen or so minutes, while she proceeded to smell and admire her precious flowers and plants. That's about when I rolled into a batch of what is known as Canadian cactus.

That does it! In payment for what she put me through, I'm gonna force Jonka to accompany me to the fights. I'm gonna have us seated on the first or second row at the ring, where the blood splattering from each boxer's punches to the other's eyes, nose, and mouth will land on her face or lap.

-Old Gargoyle