Living the dream

It turns out those Army boys in Iraq have it made, assuming they can get their boss to leave them alone.

US soldiers shy from battle in Iraq

WATERTOWN, New York – Iraq war veterans now stationed at a base here in upstate New York say that morale among US soldiers in the country is so poor, many are simply parking their Humvees and pretending to be on patrol, a practice dubbed “search and avoid” missions.

See, I do this kind of thing all the time, only I call it “avoiding work”. I’m glad “heroes” can be just as lazy as the rest of us.

Aliff [an active duty soldier with the 10th Mountain Division] said he participated in roughly 300 patrols. “We were hit by so many roadside bombs we became incredibly demoralized, so we decided the only way we wouldn’t be blown up was to avoid driving around all the time.”

“So we would go find an open field and park, and call our base every hour to tell them we were searching for weapons caches in the fields and doing weapons patrols and everything was going fine,” he said, adding, “All our enlisted people became very disenchanted with our chain of command.”

I guess I was suffering with a lack of morale whenever I goofed off at work. If I was more motivated I probably would have been working more enthusiastically. The only problem (for my boss, that is) is that I saw no reason to work harder. It’s not like it would have changed anything – there still would have been more work to do and I’d still get paid the same. Maybe being the guy everybody else dumps their work on is its own reward. For now, I’ll follow the lead of the brave boys in the US Army:

“[S]earch and avoid” missions continue today across Iraq. “One of my buddies is in Baghdad right now and we email all the time,” he explained, “He just told me that nearly each day they pull into a parking lot, drink soda and shoot at the cans. They pay Iraqi kids to bring them things and spread the word that they are not doing anything and to please just leave them alone.”

That’s pretty much the dream of any wage slave: Get left alone to drink Shasta Cola, listen to music and shoot at cans. Really, who can blame them? It’s a crappy situation to be in a country where everyone hates you, you don’t know the language, and your bosses are idiots. It’s nice to know that the American work ethic is alive and well. To quote Homer Simpson, “If you hate your job, you don’t quit. You just go in everyday and do your work real half-assed. That’s the American Way.”

Dumbledore is teh ghey

JK Rowling outs Dumbledore as gay

Harry Potter author JK Rowling has revealed that one of her characters, Hogwarts school headmaster Albus Dumbledore, is gay. She made her revelation to a packed house in New York’s Carnegie Hall on Friday, as part of her US book tour. She took audience questions and was asked if Dumbledore found “true love”.

“Dumbledore is gay,” she said, adding he was smitten with rival Gellert Grindelwald, who he beat in a battle between good and bad wizards long ago.

The audience gasped, then applauded. “I would have told you earlier if I knew it would make you so happy,” she said.

I always wondered about this but the books are fairly unclear about his relationships. The most I could get from it was that he was a “lifelong bachelor,” which can be code for “gay as a maypole” but could also mean he just never married. It’s nice that Rowling came right out and said this but why didn’t she put it in the books? I don’t think there are even any gay characters in there aside from the now-outed Dumbledore, so I figured it was another one of those fantasy worlds where everyone has “normal” sexuality. Maybe the wizarding world is just as homophobic as the real world, so Dumbledore covered because he didn’t want to get fired from his teaching job. This still leaves the question of why it wasn’t mentioned in the books. It wouldn’t have taken much either, maybe a line or two about how much Dumbledore loved Grindenwald. I hope it wasn’t just so she could trick homophobic fans into buying Deathly Hallows.

This revelation raises some interesting questions, chief of which is “who else was Dumbledore nailing during the intervening years?” Snape, perhaps? Hagrid? Or maybe Dumbledore schooled a young James Potter in the ways of manly love. I bet the fanfiction people have written all that and more, even before Rowling dropped this bombshell. Who knows, there might even be a T.H. White and Dumbledore slash out there. Maybe that’s where White got the idea for the Merlin character in his books. Or maybe Dumbedore is another one of those sexless, non-threatening gays that keep showing up in conventional fiction. The more I think about this, the more annoyed I get at Rowling for not having the strength of character to put this bit of story in the book. I think it would have done kids some good to see a positive portrayal of a non-ambiguously gay character. Oh well, we’ll just have to hope they get it right in the movies.

Carson to Santa Monica Pier Bike Route and Public Toilets

Do you own a bicycle? Do you live in the Carson, CA area? Have you ever wished you could bike to the Santa Monica Pier but didn’t know a route? Do you get nervous if you’re too far from a toilet? Are you a cheap bastard who won’t buy something just so you can use a store’s john? Well, worry no more because I wasted a couple hours making the following map (click on the picture to go to the Google map):

The route is clearly marked along with many points of interest, including public toilets. Now you can bike to the Santa Monica Pier while remaining aware of how far you are from the nearest john! No more will a weak bladder or an unexpected diarrhea attack inconvenience you!  Start living your life today!