Recently in the Amusing Category

The cuteness of a tribble, the temper of a mugatu, and the ham of a Shatner.

'Tis hard to say, which promises more Loot:
Writing, or Telling others how to do't. -- Geoff Nunberg

The grammar offered an irresistible linguistic challenge. Klingon is difficult but not impossible, weird yet totally believable. Anyone can put on a pair of pointed ears or memorize some lines of dialogue, but learning to speak Klingon requires genuine hard work.

Most languages created for fictional worlds involve simple vocabulary substitutions, such as moodge for man in A Clockwork Orange, or meaningless streams of noise, like the high-pitched jabbering of the Ewoks in Return of the Jedi. Klingon is something altogether different. There is a logic behind it; a linguist doing field research among Klingon speakers would be able to work out the system and describe it as he would an exotic indigenous tongue. -- Arika Okrent, Slate

As print takes its place alongside smoke signals, cuneiform, and hollering, there has emerged a new literary age, one in which writers no longer need to feel encumbered by the paper cuts, reading, and excessive use of words traditionally associated with the writing trade. Writing for Nonreaders in the Postprint Era focuses on the creation of short-form prose that is not intended to be reproduced on pulp fibers.

Instant messaging. Twittering. Facebook updates. These 21st-century literary genres are defining a new "Lost Generation" of minimalists who would much rather watch Lost on their iPhones than toil over long-winded articles and short stories. Students will acquire the tools needed to make their tweets glimmer with a complete lack of forethought, their Facebook updates ring with self-importance, and their blog entries shimmer with literary pithiness. All without the restraints of writing in complete sentences. w00t! w00t! Throughout the course, a further paring down of the Hemingway/Stein school of minimalism will be emphasized, limiting the superfluous use of nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, conjunctions, gerunds, and other literary pitfalls.-- McSweeney's

The caption described a photograph illustrating the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' General Conference, and it referred to the group's "Quorum of Twelve Apostates" rather than "Apostles." -- Chronicle of Higher Education

In this re-creation from "The Cage," green-skinned Orion slave girl Vena dances for Captain Pike. Why does Elchesen put in the hours necessary to create such images? "The time involved depends on if I feel like working on my latest creation or not," Elchesen said. "As for the effort, when someone sees it, I want that person to see something that is one of a kind -- never done before."  -- Wired

Matt will play the character of Mondain Minax, a cyber-space explorer and weirding weapons expert who lives more in VR than RL. Minax is a member of the crew of the alien Sontarans space vessel Zero Wing (veQDuj'oH Dujllj'e') which acts as a foil to the Stargate Universe crew during episodes 3, 7, & 11.-- Kairos News

Many married women choose to hyphenate their married name and maiden name. But there are times when you just shouldn't!! (Mature Content) CBS 13

Genki's "Red Shirt" cologne (whose tag line "Because Tomorrow May Never Come" is priceless) celebrates the sacrifices of those often nameless crew of the USS Enterprise. Described appropriately as a cologne for those with a "devotion to living each day as it could be your last" the cologne has top notes of green mandarin, bergamot, and lavender, with base notes of leather and grey musk.

Live every day as if it could be your last, with 'Red Shirt' cologne

Also available: Tiberius, and Pon Farr.

In chase mode, Pinky behaves as he does because he does not target Pac-Man's tile directly. Instead, he selects an offset four tiles away from Pac-Man in the direction Pac-Man is currently moving (with one exception). The pictures below illustrate the four possible offsets Pinky will use to determine his target tile based on Pac-Man's orientation:

If Pac-Man is moving left, Pinky's target tile will be four game tiles to the left of Pac-Man's current tile. If Pac-Man is moving right, Pinky's tile will be four tiles to the right. If Pac-Man is moving down, Pinky's target is four tiles below. Finally, if Pac-Man is moving up, Pinky's target tile will be four tiles up and four tiles to the left. This interesting outcome is due to a subtle error in the logic code that calculates Pinky's offset from Pac-Man. This piece of code works properly for the other three cases but, when Pac-Man is moving upwards, triggers an overflow bug that mistakenly includes a left offset equal in distance to the expected up offset (we will see this same issue in Inky's logic later). Don Hodges' website has an excellent article giving a thorough, code-level analysis of this bug, including the source code and a proposed fix--click here to go there now.

The Ferris wheel takes you nowhere but up and around. And it is precisely the lack of direction that makes you feel as if you are going everywhere. It doesn't feed us, doesn't clothe us, doesn't give us a home. But man, we're told, does not live on bread alone. --Stefany Anne Golberg

14 On the topic of dating, my daughter Susanna loues to remind me: ~Jvliet was only thirteen! And I remind her that i) she was Italian, an impulsive race ii), she was actually played by a middle-aged Eunuch named Ned, and iii) she died. That always shvts her right vp.

My Daughter (to her grandfather): This is my teddy bear.

My Father (to his granddaughter): I like it. Can I keep it?

My Daughter: (No answer.)

My Father: Can I have it when you're done with it?

My Daughter: You'll be dead by then.

My Father: (No answer.)

My Daughter (helpfully): When I'm done with it, I'll put it on your grave.

My Father: (No answer.)

(Later)

My Father (to me): I didn't tell her I want to be cremated. We'd have to get a little urn for the bear.

 

Today I decided to conduct an experiment. I started calling people I knew, and I asked if they had one or more video games in the house. Then I asked if they breast-fed their children. To my great shock, most answered "yes" to both. One couple I contacted switched to formula after their child's birth, and told me that they didn't play video games. The data, based on my first round of calls, was conclusive: if you play video games, you are much more likely to breast-feed your children.

Cantina

The current management of this rather seedy venue doesn't much care about appearances, apparently. Nonetheless, it's become one of the hottest spots in the area, attracting surly alcoholics from all around. A variety of local acts, the vast majority unrelentingly terrible, play here every Tuesday night.

Coincidentally, it's Tuesday night. A host of unsavory-looking people makes up your audience for the night. They're all staring at you expectantly.

A fake plastic guitar lies on the ground in front of you. Bolted to the wall is a television screen, dark and foreboding.

>_

So it begins. Text adventures, in which a world is presented in prose and interaction is through typed commands, are one of the oldest forms of computer game; music/rhythm games like Guitar Hero, in which a world is presented in dazzling color and blaring sound and interaction is through an instrument-shaped novelty peripheral, are one of the newest. When programmer Bill Meltsner combined the two recently in the satirical Champion of Guitars, the result was a textbook example of how an amusing artwork can catch on and go viral in a wired-up community that loves poking fun at itself. It's also a textbook example of the power of the so-called "lazyweb," the blogger practice of tossing a good idea out there in the hope that someone, somewhere, with more resources or less sloth, might make it a reality. -- Darren Zenko, The Toronto Star

"In just the first few weeks, I've had to engage in some of the toughest diplomacy of my life. And that was just to keep my BlackBerry.

"I finally agreed to limit the number of people who could e-mail me. It's a very exclusive list. How exclusive? Everyone look at the person sitting on your left. Now look at the person sitting on your right. None of you have my e-mail address." -- Barack Obama

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies covers the same ground as the original masterpiece - only that ground is full freshly-vacated graves.  The "strange plague" has been the scourge of England for years.  London has been walled off, and the countryside is littered with zombies (politely referred to as "unmentionables").  Attacks occur on a daily basis - overwhelming the conventional army, and leaving England's defense to a small band of highly-trained hunter/killers.

The Bennet sisters have spent their lives training in the deadly arts, and are considered among the finest slayers of the undead.  None is more feared or admired than the lovely Elizabeth - a serious girl who has no time for silly things like love.  But when Elizabeth meets a haughty fellow slayer named Darcy, she discovers there's one thing she can't defend against...Cupid's arrow (cue sweeping romantic music).

He thinks that he will never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

But poems charm and poems please,
And many are lovelier than "Trees."

A tree whose hungry mouth is pressed
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast,

Can hardly look at God all day,
While lifting leafy arms to pray.

Where are her eyes, mouth, arms, and head?
Perhaps she lifts her legs instead.

Can that same tree in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair?

Perhaps her arms (or legs?) are hairy.
A tree like that should make one wary.

That bosom on which snow has lain?
You'll search a tree for it in vain.

Unless . . . a hairy bosom too?
That tree belongs inside a zoo.

One line is good. I can't complain
Of "intimately lives with rain."

Bad poems persist; they sadden me.
Not even God could make that tree.

--David L. Hoover, 2004 (Reproduced with permission.)

The Freytag Pyramid

Concocted 146 years ago by a German philologist, Freytag's pyramid was long held aloft as the one-size-fits-all narrative template, despite the fact that it describes the tidy Aristotelian side of storytelling (Ben-Hur) far better than its frayed quantum fringes (Memento). Techniques like open-ended conclusion, audience interactivity, and nonlinear chronology "were part of the avant-garde 30 or 40 years ago," says UCLA film school dean Robert Rosen, "but they're taken for granted now."

Fortunately for Western civilization, I've developed a new model. Allow me to introduce Brown's Ziggurat (in 4-D!)^tm. It accounts for all the time-shredding, symmetry-defying, viewer-inclusive wackiness of New Story. --Scott Brown, Wired