NEVER JET HOT

I don't whether the editor is trying to be clever, or just not paying attention.

I guess this is what passes for "good news" at The Seattle Times . The headline: Baby boomer deaths: good business for funeral industry I didn't have the intestinal fortitude to click on it.

I see where Microsoft bid 44.6 BILLION dollars (pinkie in mouth here) - Are they nuts? They could have had TheRestlessMouse.com Novelty Empire for half that.

CelebPulp.com Celebrity Gossip I was looking at the gossip sheet here and I see that we neglected to observe Justin Timberlake's birthday. Dammit.

We have been following this car wreck of a primary election process with varying degrees of interest, surprise, amusement and dread. When we bought the remaining stock from Lakeside Novelty, we inherited tons of these political bills. Hence I have sort of an interest in Hillary getting the democratic nomination, just so we can keep peddling this silly fake money. I know, I am a sad and pathetic little man, and you pity me. Anyway, I was sort of pleased to see that the oddsmakers are in my corner; Super Tuesday Political Betting Odds Online gambling website Bodog Life has Hillary Clinton a big -400 favorite to receive win the majority of primaries on Super Tuesday among Democrats. Senator Barack Obama is most certainly the underdog here paying out $2.50 for every $1.00 bet should he win more than Hillary. John Edwards bowed out of the race early on Wednesday following the Florida Primary. JUST THE SAME - We have all of this political money on sale DIRT CHEAP - $1.99 for each pad of 25 -...

WASHINGTON VOTERS FORCED TO LIE OR STAY HOME "Primary voters will have to pick one party's ballot and sign an oath that they consider themselves a member of that party and haven't attended the other party's caucus." ... Maybe I want to vote FOR a member of a particular party as a NO VOTE on another candidate of that party? And it just so happens that I do not consider myself a member of any particular political entity, least of all the donkey or the elephant. Do I have to LIE to participate? Now my understanding is that we have a caucus and then a primary vote. The Republicans are splitting the results as far as assigning delegates; Democrats are completely IGNORING the results of the primary vote. It seems to me that the caucus consists of the most dogged political junkies and assorted other nutjobs. Apparently, for the most part nationally, THEY get to decide which candidate from each party wins the swimsuit competition, and proceeds to the big dog and pony...

WEATHERMAN SAYS: North Puget Sound supposed to get up to 2 inches of snow tonight. State patrol advises motorists to keep food, water, clothes in their vehicles "in case they get stranded". Gunna get stranded in TWO INCHES of snow?? We can hear New Yorkers laughing from here.

I'm still trying to figure why I need this "twitter.com" - If I saw a monkey walking down my street, I would probably use my cellphone to email a picture of it to the mrs. - I pay T-mobile $60+ a month just to ensure I am ready for such eventualities. Twitter really shines when you're away from your computer. By hooking up your mobile phone, you can receive updates from those you're following (or just some people) when you're waiting in boring lines. And you can send updates, like "OMG, there's a monkey walking down the street!"—which, lets face it, you're unlikely to see while you're indoors.

Our local "consumer guy", Herb Weisbaum, is really scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to come up with "How to spend less on those last-minute gifts" tips. Get this; First, be skeptical of all sales. Sometimes the discounts aren't what they seem to be. "Because they're not based on the MSRP, the manufacturer's suggested retail price, but on a made up original price," said Shop Smart's Lisa Lee Freeman. What do they think the MSRP is? Somewhere along the line, someone has to pull a made-up price out of his or her ass. It's all made up. But wait! There's more; If you're shopping online, do it first thing in the morning. Shop Smart says you'll get the best deals that way. "They often offer good deals early in the day. That's when traffic is lighter so they're really trying to grab people and get sales," Freeman said. Yeah right! Like we have time to fart around with the website all day. I don't know ...

D.B. Cooper, where are you? For Pete's sake, it's been 36 years. Give it a rest already. Shouldn't you guys be more interested in finding a certain tall skinny bearded fellow?

Kitsap County man uses shotgun to loosen lug nut I feel bad for this guy because cars hate me too. Apparently it's a very bad idea to use a shotgun at this range. Typical of the Herald, they don't say whether it loosed the lug nut.

It was probably only a 6 and a half foot python. The media likes to exaggerate.

This Homer update was brought to you by our Dashboard Talking Homer Simpson and the letter "H"

The Restless Mouse fully and without hesitation supports the effort to get a star on the Hollywood "Walk of Fame" for Weird Al. Parody is an important aspect of the music scene. And before you scoff, check out The list of stars . If Mariah Carey gets one, Weird Al should have three.

I was just reading that a couple in China has applied to name their baby "@". (In Chinese the english "at" sounds like "love him", I am told.) People used to say that "Coke" translates to "Bite the wax tadpole", which is making me hungry. I hope this mom in China doesn't decide to make this a theme, with the punctuation, and naming the dog asterick, etc. She'll be calling out the back door, @!! #!! &y! (andy) $! Get in here right now! Get * out of the driveway! They will know they are in trouble when she calls them all at once with the middle names too- @)#!&y^$$ (calling them) @)#!&y^$$ (swearing) What's in a name? # will go on to work for the telephone company. Expect big things from $. That is all I got.

It's quick and easy to use this new Jing.com picture sharing thingie. Here we have some men looking for missing sewer workers in St. Paul Minn. after recent torrential rains. But, aren't they technically storm-drain workers? OH, apparently it doesn't put the image on the PC clipboard, just a link to it. Shoot, what good is that? Back to using Picasa and HELLO I guess.

"We are spreading toilet culture. People can listen to gentle music and watch TV" - 1000 toilets, it's like the Disneyland of defecating! Look how dirty the floor is already! Ick!

Synthetic snot boosts robot nose A layer of artificial "snot" has been found to improve the ability of an "electronic nose" to precisely sniff out aromas in foods and perfumes. "Our artificial mucus not only offers improved odour discrimination for electronic noses it also offers much shorter analysis times than conventional techniques," said Professor Julian Gardner of the University of Warwick and one of the team behind the work. Hmmm, and I always thought snot interfered with the sniffing. Especially those big old "boxcar boogers". Shows how much I know.

Petey D. Dog must have been sleeping in the living room, the newspaper lady apparently managed to hit the house with the Sunday paper again and startled him. So I woke up to "THUMP ARF! ARF! ARF! ARF! ARF! grrrrrrrr..." The grrrrrrrr part may have been Teresa. I would ask her to put the papers in the little box at the end of the driveway, but I'm kind of afraid of someone who can hit the house with a Sunday paper from the road, esp. while seated inside a car.