Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

“A king is only a king if we bow down.” – Rev. William Barber

Celebrate the fucking wins.

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

A tremendous foreign policy asset… to all of our adversaries.

Bark louder, little dog.

When we show up, we win.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

People are complicated. Love is not.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

People really shouldn’t expect the government to help after they watched the GOP drown it in a bathtub.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

Giving up is unforgivable.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Truth in Advertising

Truth in Advertising

by | 51 Comments

This post is in: 

I’ve been absent (if not notably so) from this or any other intertubz locale lately — a combination of end-of-semester madness* and exactly what John was talking about in this post.  Some days, I can’t do more than pull the metaphoric blankets over my head, get my schadenfreude jollies by reading NY Jets blogs, and blast songs like this:

Heart Attack and Vine

But I’m better now.  Or rather, the world is worse, and I’m levelling up, ready to go.  I’ve got a bit more substantive stuff on tap, but just to get going, I thought I’d share this bit of advertising brio, reported  under the headline, “Babies Cost More Than Condoms”:

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(h/t the Economix blog at the NYTimes.)

Enjoy — and I guess, this is the kind of frivolity that could be considered an open thread.

*Over the last couple of days I’ve spent time discussing whether the threshold for a given requirement should read “most if not all” or “all major assignments.”  I burbled with colleagues in a team-taught course over the implications of a B+/A- on a given paper counts for more or less than an A-/B+ on a different project.  And this morning I had to affirm a decision to flunk some kid.  After which I kicked a puppy.

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Ahhh…the life of the mind.

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I’m not complaining, never, and certainly not in this economy.  I do work I enjoy, indoors, there is a feudal quality to my employment security.  But even so, there are days when one’s stream of consciousness turns into a fetid ooze…

…and on those days?  Silence is a virtue.

(and of course, this entire footnote is here just to get another Weird Tales cover up on the blog. ;)

Image:  Virgil Finlay, Cover of Weird Tales, March 1953, volume 45, number 1.

Reader Interactions

51Comments

  3. 3.

    Mnemosyne

    My “check engine” light went on for the first time last night and freaked me the hell out, because my car is 12 years old, which means repairs are starting to get pricey. The guy at the shop said it could be any one of 30 different sensors, so they’re supposed to call me after they do the diagnostic. Feh.

  5. 5.

    BGinCHI

    I never thought this blog would pivot from pets to auto repair, but there you have it.

    Nothing beats being under warranty. It’s like the public option for cars.

  6. 6.

    TheMightyTrowel

    Goodness I know how you feel. Oceans of essays to mark, grades to agonise over and a conference (where I’m presenting 2 papers) this weekend… not enough hours in the day.

  7. 7.

    Cris

    What a coincidence, John Jos. Miller just posted a bunch of Weird Tales covers over at Cheese Magnet.

    And to illustrate their bizarre and phantasmagorical tales, there was the Queen of Weird Tales, Margaret Brundage. […] Using her own daughters for models, she imbued her paintings with a smouldering sensuality never seen before on the magazine racks, and which since has only been equaled by a very few, and never surpassed. What’s amazing is that she accomplished her artistic triumphs in an age of near-Victorian prudishness.

  8. 8.

    The Republic of Stupidity

    @Mnemosyne:

    I’ve had that happen several times now w/ my 22 yr old pick up truck, dude, and the last two times, I just kept on driving it for a week or so, and the light just went out on its own, and nothing happened…

    Just saying…

    Also… too… I love the covers on those old pulp magazines…

  9. 9.

    MattF

    Just to note that Horace Mann is a rather tony private school where one can expect to find helicopter-parents zooming in and hovering over their offspring from every approach path. So… it’s, y’know, a joke.

  11. 11.

    WereBear

    Also, too, the stupid “Check Engine” light could mean it had just rained, or that you are about to drop your engine in the street.

    That’s why I like meters, not idiot lights.

  12. 12.

    Crashman

    Some days, I can’t do more than pull the metaphoric blankets over my head, get my schadenfreude jollies by reading NY Jets blogs

    The schadenfreude has been delicious these last two weeks.

  16. 16.

    The Republic of Stupidity

    @WereBear:

    Right… that’s the problem w/ those damned things…

    Seeing as my truck has, like, 210K miles on it, I’m not inclined to invest tons of cash in prolonging its life… and so far, I’ve gotten away w/ ignoring that damned light a couple of times… my mechanic would no doubt love to charge me several hundred of my hard earned dollars to look at it and find SOMETHING he can justify fixing…

    (I’m getting ready to upgrade, vehicle-wise… ANOTHER good reason to not take that dashboard light too seriously…)

  17. 17.

    Loneoak

    Ahhh…the life of the mind.

    We had an epic grading clusterfuck. One of my TAs deleted (by accident? by incompetence?) a crucial part of the grading formula in her spreadsheet and we built the curve for the entire class including that incorrect data. So all of her students are dropping almost a full letter grade and the rest of the class is going up by around a third of a grade. That means ~150 forms the registrar needs signed by three people.

    Fuuuucccckkkk.

  19. 19.

    eemom

    Guess who said this:

    That is not to say that the part of HCR Hudson is attempting to kneecap doesn’t have it coming. The insurance mandate truly sucks, but this is what happens when the president trades away the opening gambit of the public option in return for the Magic Beans of Comity and this is why America can’t have nice things like universal healthcare.

    Hint: “the ONLY reason I EVER click on that place is _____.”

    He has drunk the Jane-aid.

  20. 20.

    Stillwater

    @Mnemosyne:Usually (usually) on older cars the check engine light comes on because the O2 sensor went out. That’s a pretty cheap part, easy to install. I hope your mechanic is someone you trust!

  21. 21.

    BGinCHI

    @Loneoak: Ouch.

    One reason I still use an old-fashioned grade book in pen.

    Sooo many papers and exams to grade this week. I wish there was a grading drug I could take to help with this…..

  22. 22.

    Sugar Baby

    Like John, I have been having car problems and with the resolution of the tax issue am looking to upgrade, but cannot pick a color. I am partial to the baby blue, but thought I would ask for input here.

  24. 24.

    Alwhite

    @Mnemosyne:

    My check engine light came on while we were on a trip – scared the crap out of me so I pulled into the first service station I saw. $70 later I learned that I had not tightened my gas cap sufficiently the last time I filled up.

  25. 25.

    TheMightyTrowel

    @BGinCHI: I have one of those: Port.

    The best thing I learned in my UK doctoral program(me): port is like wine only better.

    ETA: don’t bother with fiddly little glasses, swig it from the bottle or from whatever juice glasses you have lying around.

  26. 26.

    Alwhite

    @BGinCHI:

    Nothing beats being under warranty. It’s like the public option for cars.

    You mean I could have gotten a better warranty if only Obama had taken to the bully pulpit during the GM bailout? Damn him, he’s worse the Dumbell-u! 8-{D

  29. 29.

    Mnemosyne

    @BGinCHI:

    My car doesn’t need a public option, it needs Medicare. Where’s my Medicare for elderly cars? ;-)

    I’m hoping it’s something minor because reliability is the reason I buy Toyotas, but we’ll see how it goes.

  31. 31.

    Mnemosyne

    @WereBear:

    I force G to admire the pictures of Tristan every time you post a new picture. He pretends to protest, but he can’t help doing an “awwww” every time.

  35. 35.

    Jager

    My freshman year, I had an affable, old biology prof. Dr McBlank loved to teach and understood 85% of us would never take another science class if we could avoid it. His job as he saw it, was to give us a few tools we could use later in life, like possibly read an article in Scientific American. He had an evil TA, this guy hated the fact he was assigned to a class with little or no interest in his life’s work. The old prof slipped on the stairs and was in the hospital for a couple of weeks. The TA gave us our mid-term, it was mind boggling hard. I remember walking out of the test and my lab partner looked at me and said, “were we taking the right test”? She was shaken to her core. The results were delayed and when the old prof came back he told us, using the curve, 21% would be a passing grade! The TA was never in charge of testing again, the old Doc offered a make up test, one that matched the classwork and the entire class took it over with the exception on an asian woman who did really well on the first one, personally, I think she was dating the the TA! Don’t envy you your job.

  38. 38.

    Cat Lady

    Jeebus Tom, do you live with me? I too have gone galt from this place and the news with the comment sections to any and all of the J-E-T-S articles and message boards. Hoo, boy. The Bears fans are more or less sanguine, but the Jets fans have all come unmoored. Rex Ryan and Schotty may end up sleeping with the fishes. The Hoodie has apparently dealt a fatal blow. :-D

  39. 39.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Svensker: My feeling about TBogg is similar to my feeling about Mike Judge. Surprisingly solid after all this time, but every once in a while throws a total ideological clunker.

  40. 40.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Cat Lady: There seems to be a general sense of disappointment and hopelessness building… I don’t think all of it is really about Mark Sanchez or even Obama, just people getting tired and pissed off about the setbacks and stumbles of things that were supposed to be better by now.

  41. 41.

    Cat Lady

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Yup. It’s the 24/7 FAIL media shit show enabling our 24/7 FAIL politicians that have driven me to sports media 24/7. Other than the 24/7 Favre-fellating (which is finally thankfully ending), they’re way more honest.

  48. 48.

    asiangrrlMN

    @WereBear: Damn. That is one cute cat. I would just nom nom nom his ears all day long.

    @eemom: Sigh. I know. I have relegated him to the bottom of my ‘must read’ list (honestly, mostly for the Bassets), and he may be nudged off permanently soon.

    @Sugar Baby: Black (but I will always choose black, so YMMV).

  49. 49.

    stickler

    @BGinCHI: Heh. “Sooo many papers and exams to grade this week. I wish there was a grading drug I could take to help with this….. ” There is such a drug, and it’s available at a store near you. It’s called Beer.

    Just got back from a three-beer lunch, as it happens. That is my grading drug. (And I still have the pile of blue books to get through, and one more exam to give tomorrow.)

    Kill me now.

  50. 50.

    Mnemosyne

    If anyone wants to hear the end of the car story, I took it in and they couldn’t figure out why the check engine light went on, so they ended up resetting it. At least they didn’t charge me for that part.

    They did discover that my front struts are leaking (?) and will need to be replaced to the tune of $1300. Gah. I can’t do it until the week after Christmas, so I will be driving carefully until then.

  51. 51.

    Comrade Sock Puppet of the Great Satan

    “Weird Tales did have great covers.”

    It did. interesting that according to wiki, the most iconic scantily-clad-girl covers were done by a female artist who used her daughters as models.

    So a mom and her daughters launched the girl-in-chainmail-bikini staple of fantasy art.

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