Posts Tagged ‘The recession’
The 203K Lip balm holder
Good news! The recession is over. Well it actually barely ever happened for the kind of person who would spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a single piece of clothing that won’t even match most of their shoes.
Of course the news of this wild fashion spending spree come from Texas, where style doesn’t so much go to die as it does go to be executed with an IQ south of 75. Apparently, a buyer in Dallas purchased a Hermes pocket book “made of crocodile hide and (also) features 18-karat white gold, diamond-encrusted hardware” for $203,150. This makes it both the most expensive handbag of all time and America’s gayest superlative.
When reading this news, we must consider what we ourselves would expect in a bag that cost 203k:
-$203,050 worth of cocaine
-The leather must come from one of Silvio Berlusconi’s many facelifts
-Cashmere kleenexes and mints that have all been licked by the Queen of England
-Some sort of time machine to 2006 when this would have been cool
-A pistol to shoot whatever moron bought this (hey, it is Texas!)
Indeed, I’m willing to bet that now that Texas Governor Rick Perry is just officially dead in the polls, that he’s just using his campaign warchest to buy his wife’s christmas presents while they still can.
Santa 2011 and the Ho Ho Homeless
Yikes. This might be the most depressing news item of the year: The New York Times is reporting that America’s most prestigious Mall Santa-training school is teaching it’s Kris Kringles (note: is he like Kardashian?) to be jolly in this recession as they “swiftly size up families’ financial circumstances, gently scale back children’s Christmas gift requests and even how to answer the wish some say they have been hearing with more frequency — ‘Can you bring my parent a job?'”.
Now while this story may make you want to hang yourself with your holiday lights (or festively defenestrate yourself), here are some examples of how Mall Santas can make recession Christmas fun and affordable!
Santa: And what would you like for Christmas little boy? Little boy: I want a puppy! Santa: Who wants an expensive dog when you could have a…free raccoon! (Hands red bag with thrashing animal inside).or
Santa: Hello little girl! Have you been naughty or nice? Little girl: Nice! And I want a new doll house Santa. Santa: Well why would you want a pricey new little doll house when your neighborhood is chock full of free and big foreclosed homes for you to play in?or
Little girl: Santa, can you find my mommy a new job? Santa: No but if she wants to meet me in the parking lot in ten minutes she can have a swig of Santa’s gin and a hit of Special K!Ohhhh god this story is sad. Still, there is a silver lining: a degree from a Mall Santa School, unlike a traditional university, actually lands people jobs! Maybe it’s time for Oberlin to drop Queer Studies and start teaching (Rein)deer Studies…
Halfing the half-assed Congress
Rick Perry is a man of action. Well he only actually gets stuff done if it invovles murdering coyotes. But still, he is a man of action! That’s why he recently announced his radical governmental overhaul plan (piss off, Constitution!), where he would implement “term limits for federal judges and Supreme Court justices” and create “laws criminalizing insider trading among legislators” and, ummm, well, what was the third? The EPA? ~Shrugs~ Oops.
Oh right! He would make Congress more like the Texas legislature and turn Congresspeople into “part-time legislators”. Listen Rick, if my experience in that world taught me anything, it’s that part-time employees are kind of worthless. Part-time Congresspeople will just show up to work high, nap in the Senate cloak room and spend their time sending out resumes to full-time national legislatures. Besides, Congress is CONSTANTLY going into recess anyway. Like, they aren’t there about half the time anyway. I don’t know how them being there less would suddenly up make Congress better and more productive: Cutting nothing in half still leaves you with nothing.
And in an era where people are being forced to take part-time jobs because full-time positions are just simply unavailable, wouldn’t it be nice if there was at least one group of Americans wasn’t at home doing nothing every Tuesday and Thursdays before noon? We don’t all need to watch The Price Is Right!
America’s next financial bubble: Giant Pumpkins
If I know anything about America, and I think as a French major I do, it’s that we as a people are highly competitive and see vegetables not so much as a source of good nutrition but as a way to feed that competitive spirit.
That’s why I found this New York Times article about the race to grow a one ton pumpkin so fascinating and terrifying. It’s clear that all the factors that led us into our current credit crisis are at work in our nation’s competitive pumpkin growing industry.
You see, no one yet has grown a one ton pumpkin, but that isn’t stopping people from trying. Grower Don Young of Iowa told The Times that he “spends $8,000 a year on his pumpkin (growing) hobby, money he admits he does not really have. His modest one-bedroom house is smaller than his backyard.” I mean, I suppose growing a pumpkin that’s bigger than your house isn’t the worst investment, but despite what Mother Goose would have you believe unconventional houses – like the Gingerbread House in Hansel and Gretel and the shoe that the old woman lived in – don’t really retain their value well.
If that wasn’t enough, apparently the seeds from giant pumpkins are the new 2 bedroom condos in West Palm Beach, Florida (i.e. investment items with wildly inflated prices). As I’m sure you know, big pumpkins produce big healthy seeds, and according to this article after growing a 1,810 pound pumpkin, a man sold just one of its seeds for $1600. $1600??? That better come with a pumpkin spice flavored half-key of cocaine!
Maybe we need to turn this into a positive: perhaps the one ton pumpkin could be our new Apollo Program, giving our nation a crazy dream to inspire us all. Don’t say it’s impossible! Somewhere in America right now someone is working at become the first one ton person – I don’t see why we can’t expect the same from our pumpkins.
Friendly’s dies (Presumably of cardiac arrest)
It is a sad but universal truth that time marches on. Well, sometimes it doesn’t so much “march” as it does waddle towards its rascal scooter…
After years of pioneering research into the physical limits of where chefs’ could put cheese (Grilled Cheese Cheeseburgers and Mac-n-Cheese Quesidillas anyone?), the restaurant chain Friendly’s is reportedly planning to file for bankruptcy.
Business analysts claim that mid-sized chain restaurants have been badly effected by the recession, but we all know that secretly it’s because their clientele has the bad fortune of constant heart explosions. Yay, for just as Jesus told of the man whose house was destroyed because he built upon the sand, so too can a restaurant be destroyed when it is built on deep fried ranch dressing balls.
Sad.
Tramp Stamps at the Post Office
I’m pretty sure the only way to make the Post Office revelant again would be to hang out free blowjobs with every roll of stamps but since that’s only legal in Nevada, I guess the USPS has settled on shaking up stamps themselves to get people’s attention. The Post Office then recently announced that living people can now be featured on US Stamps. The rule used to be that you had to be dead for 5 years before you go a stamp. I guess Steve Irwin died for nothing!
This development alarms me though: honoring only dead people has a way of weeding out the people who don’t really deserve that great honor. Mail is still kind of emotionally important, ya know? Do you really want to send Grannie a thank you note with the cast of The Jersey Shore on it? Or what about mailing your wedding invitation with a stamp celebrating Kim Kardashian’s giant ass? Unless the theme of your wedding is “Armenian brothel” in which case go ahead and I’ll have the chicken!
Ahahaha. Stamp collecting blog posts are fun.
Jesus loves you, hates your 401k
In times of trouble many turn to God…and apparently 20% of people were then told by the Almighty to go fuck themselves.
Baylor University released a study today about God and the economy which found that “one in five Americans combine a view of God as actively engaged in daily workings of the world with an economic conservative view that opposes government regulation and champions the free market”. The other 4/5ths are lazy good-for-nothing atheists!
Did you know that the Bible proves that God hates big government? Look at economic crap storm those secular humanists in Europe are facing. Those godless Chinese socialists? Well, umm, everyone knows God doesn’t give a shit about what non-White people do. Furthermore, to suggest that Jesus wasn’t an Ayn Rand-loving free market capitalist is blasephemy: I mean, he only attacked those greedy money changers in the Temple IRONICALLY. Yup, Jesus was super meta like that.
And for those of you who would say that the economy is a deeply human invention and it’s incredibly depressing and fatalistic to assume that economic hardship can only be fixed by God, I would say DEVIL BE GONE!!!
Besides, everyone knows that Jews (like your editor) control the economy, not God.
Sorry, the United States is not Hiring
So I don’t know how many of you woke up with this letter in your Inbox today, but according to the U.S. Government our country’s economy added ZERO jobs last month. Zero. Looks like we need a jobs plan! I’ll make things a little easier on Obama by announcing my plan to boost employment:
1. Attack the Moon– She is a coward who only shows herself at night
2. Start collective rice farms– Say what you want about the Khmer Rouge, they did have a very low unemployment rate
3. Stop counting the “FUNemployed“-You know, ignore that kid Josh from your freshman hall who now just WOOFs
4. Make all the unemployed Obama administration interns– I think 9.1% of people are qualified to fetch Barack his coffee.
5. Prayer-Who needs a job when you’ve got Jesus?
6. Raise taxes very slightly on the top 1% to pay for massive infrastructure improvements, vocational training, green job initiatives and end tax loop holes that allow big companies to pay no taxes while small companies get eaten alive by international competition/global economic forces.
Wait that last one wasn’t funny…
The Baby Boomer Boogie Man
With the advertising-and-subscription based news business model failing so miserably, some publications have turned towards scaring their target demographics to drum up business. Only unlike in the late 19th century this shit is not about those dastardly Spaniards…
In today’s world of news, the easiest targets are the Baby Boomers, and there is no one better to scare these people than the The New York Times, who today wrote a lovely piece about how Baby Boomer’s children will never find jobs. Looks like little Emily and Josh will be using their degrees from Darmouth and Michigan to do lowly awful things like be someone’s assistant and wait tables. They might as well bare knuckle box hobos for meth!
But don’t worry, frightened and stupid Baby Boomer. Sure your generation ruined the economy for everyone, but these articles pop up every few weeks simply to scare you into subscribing to the New York Times. And you should subscribe to them: not just because they’re the Paper of Record, but also because your children will need copies of the paper to build their paper-mache shanty towns.
Just think of it as recycling. Recycling is hip! You’re a hip mom!
The Mark(et) of the Beast
I hope you’ve all done your neck stretches, because over the past few days the stock market has had some crazy ups and downs. Yesterday it lost big, and as of 11:00 am on Tuesday August 9th the DOW is shooting up! Ugh bi-polar stock markets are the worst.
Some people however are even seeing signs of satanism in this instability, as the S&P lost 6.66% yesterday. 6.66? It’s the mark of the beast! Satan is here and he’s playing the free-floating capilization-weighted indexes (No, I don’t know what that means either folks)!
Of course, this market turmoil is just terrible for Barack Obama, what with his administration’s lackluster performance and well-known ties to the Prince of Darkness.
I’ll tell you who this bode well for: Rick Perry. His state-sponsored Jesus-fest this weekend showed the world that the key to economic success is through massively under-funding social programs and out of control deregulation beating Satan in a wrestling match.
Hallelujah!
E PLURIBUS MORON 