I keep threatening to go Galt and take some time off, but I keep reading things that irritate me. However, if I were to go Galt, it would look a lot like this:
Or maybe this:
Or maybe a little like this:
Claim your pets.
And I can not lie- the pooch going Galt in a bucket may be my favorite pet pic ever featured here. This website may need to adopt him as our site co-mascot with Tunch.
And if you have pics of your pet going Galt, send them in. I still have a ton of pictures to get out there, but I will get ’em all up one of these days.
beltane
Eh. While those guys are going Galt, my old gray tabby is out there getting all the chipmunks.
Svensker
The pooch pic is the cutest. But I want to BE kitty #2.
cleek
i can haz Sam Adams ?
i could get some good Galting done with a 12 of Sam, right about now.
Incertus
I’d like to go Galt right now, but instead I’m getting ready to teach a 3 hour class this evening. I’m reading “The Dead” for the first time since grad school.
Oh, and fuck Donald Rumsfeld, though that’s not a particularly original emotion.
PeakVT
Ah, so that’s where the bukkit is.
Ash Can
That doggie needs a little bitty table next to his bucket with a miniature umbrella drink on it. I bet he could use a pair of shades too.
J.
That dog-in-a-bucket shot is fantastic — and the kitties are darn cute, too. But enough with the Ayn Rand crap.
MikeJ
You can never have enough mockery of randroids.
Keith G
Love the Boston Terrier.
My two girls might consider going Gault, but right now they are too busy being ninja kitties.
Scott
Dammit, PeakVT stole my bukkit joke.
MNPundit
You know one thing that annoys me when you take pictures is that if I click on the huge white space next to the pictures, it’s like clicking on the photos themselves. This is annoying because I generally click on white-space so that my mouse wheel works again to scroll the page and I can’t do that here.
NonyNony
Doesn’t “Going Galt” involve setting yourself up with a bunch of other people in a commune in the mountains, living off the land and generally shutting yourself off from society at large? Back in my day, we called those kind of folks “hippies”. I assume there would be fewer children named “Galadriel” in a Galt commune, though possibly a few more named “Ayn” or “Rand”.
Beauzeaux
The pooch in the bucket bears a strong likeness to Blinky from Tom Tomorrow’s This Modern World.
geg6
Love the doggie-in-a-bucket.
Wish I could go Galt. Today I will spend my afternoon at a several hour high school awards assembly, giving out scholarships. The only reason I am obligated to stay for the entire assembly is that it is my high school alma mater and they expect me to stay and hang around for the tea afterwards where I will be forced to be nice to old high school teachers (amazing there are still some teaching!) and old classmates whose children are now graduating. Then I will have to zoom out of there to make to another high school for an awards banquet this evening until about 8 or so.
Uggh. The good news is that the Pens played last night so I won’t miss that and I couldn’t get tickets to Springsteen tonight so I won’t be killing myself to get there.
LD50
The first picture needs a caption. Let me see…
IM IN UR BUKKIT
STEELIN UR GALT
…suggestions welcome.
cleek
IM IN YR BUKKIT, WITHHOLDIN MAH PRODUKTIVITEE
LD50
Perfect. I will slink off in shame for not having thought of that.
Except that the second line should maybe be spelled “WIFFOLDIN MAH PRODUKTIVITEE”.
Woody
I concur with the nomination of the little boston bull as co-mascot. Great little dogs (who give rise to the claim that, in a dog’s mind, there is no such thing as a ‘small’ dog.
As to “going Galt,’ if one regards the utter, complete, catastrophic, clusterfucking chaos that has beset the USer Govt since the installation of Raygun in 1981, one would necessarily be led to the conclusion that anybody who mattered a bit, or could have conductred things differently, had in fact “gone Galt” in 1980, or maybe even in ’79…
wasabi gasp
@MNPundit: One way to deal with this, if you’re using Firefox, is to disallow tab focus by adding the following to your userChrome.css file or a Stylish rule.
.tabbrowser-tab { -moz-user-focus: ignore !important; }Meh, it doesn’t display propery in the comments.
Laura W
Isn’t the whole point of you going Galt to stop reading things that irritate you?
That’s like me saying: “I keep threatening to mop the kitchen floor, but the cats keep puking on it.”
Never mind. I get your point.
Roger Moore
@cleek:
Shouldn’t that be “IZ IN YR BUKKIT”, not “IM IN YR BUKKIT”. I must consult the LOLSPEAK dictionary…
John Cole
@Woody: How are they with cats?
LD50
I’m not a first-language speaker, but ‘UR’ feels more right to me than ‘YR’.
Catsy
That dog is ugly as sin, but even I have to admit that picture is completely awesome.
Ash Can
@Woody: I do recall a wave of retirements of moderate Republicans at that time. As I watched them depart and the Reaganites secure their grip on the levers of power, I thought, “That’s it; we’re fucked.”
MNPundit
What you mean like this: img.photobucket.com/albums/v102/SSJPabs/LOLDOG.jpg
schrodinger's cat
Captions for the photos
1. I has a bukkit
2. I iz on Ur rug catching my zzz’z
3. John Cole kitteh is going Galt
jcricket
Did anyone see the headline where Michael Steele says, “Era of Apologizing for GOP mistakes is officially over”?
My first thought was, there is probably a follow-on quote stating, “From now on, all the GOP mistake making will continue, we’ll just not be apologizing for it. Fo shizzle”.
donovong
Mister Cole: I can understand your need for a break, and sympathize. However, Mr. Sullivan has already gone over the wall this week, and I cannot live without the both of you for that long.
Please submit your vacation request with enough advance notice to allow for coordination with the other leftwing blogs.
And, yes, the bukkit pooch has definite merit.
Betsy
All three of those pictures just made my morning. Thank you!!!
Adrienne
@donovong: Seconded.
PeakVT
Because it’s patriotic to not pay taxes when the president is Barack Hussein Shabazz Guevara de Gaulle Obama.
Brady Bonk
Now, that is a pooch who is serious about stopping the engine of the world. Good doggie.
amorphous
@LD50: If you can find a font small enough, the caption should be Galt’s entire speech, translated into LOLCAT, natch.
amorphous
@donovong: Which leftwing blogs are you referring to, then?
John Cole
I try to avoid the fanboy boosterism, but I just heard the Preznit say “I’m in a voluble mood today, so let me introduce the rest of my team.”
Can you ever, in a million years, imagine Bush using the word “voluble,” and not only that, using it correctly?
wasabi gasp
John, that last comment I posted: it was a tip that keeps me from losing my head while browsing and I thought MNPundit might find it handy, but it wouldn’t display properly, so it was essentially useless anyway. But, is that kind off thing a no-no?
Throwin Stones
John,
Just glad you’re alive after the shower/mop/toilet incident last night.
donovong
@amorphous: All those which are patronized and/or published primarily by animal loving DFH’s and reformed rightwing pervs like John Cole, of course.
Adrienne
@John Cole: I’m gonna go with “Hell to the Naw” for $1000″ Alex.
Mostly because I could never imagine Bush using any word that I would have to look up.
ronathan richardson
The pooch in the bucket–“Yeah I’m in a bucket, no i don’t care what you think, and no I’m not moving.”
Dr. Squid
@PeakVT:
Apparently Fox went and stoled the bukkit.
donovong
@John Cole: No, not any more than I can imagine Obama making the stupid fucking comments that W was so fond of. Night and day, brother, night and day.
Face
From teh look on the doggie’s face, I’d say the caption is this:
OK, just like I do in the pool…..uhmmm, warm…..almost finished……ah, much better!
Roger Moore
@LD50:
You are, of course, correct. So the corrected quote should be:
IZ IN UR BUKKIT
WITHHOLDIN MAH PRODUKTIVITEE
Dennis-SGMM
@jcricket:
Steele went on to say, “We will continue to relentlessly call out Obama for continuing the failed policies of his predecessor; Bill Clinton.”
Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon)
@John Cole:
Good vocabulary, a First Lady with biceps, beautiful children… After the last 8 years, I’ll take what I can get.
Ash Can
OT, but while we’re lightening our moods a bit here, this is appropriate: Obama announces new mileage and emissions standards. Maybe the standards aren’t as strict as some of us would like, but 1) anything is better than nothing, 2) this marks the introduction of a national emissions standard, and 3) the automakers are on board with it, which eliminates what has routinely been a major obstacle to progress in this area.
Cue right-wing bitching about the resulting vehicle-cost increases in 3, 2,…
Dreggas
I’m working because I can’t afford to go Galt.
J.
Btw, we just got our FURminator. Any advice on how, when, and where to use it on our two unsuspecting cats? We were thinking of cornering them in the kitchen, which has a tile floor. And, of course, filming it.
Laura Clawson
The doggie in the bucket reminds me of a barn I used to ride at, where there were of course a couple Jack Russells. During the summer, there’d be a low, wide bucket left out for them and every now and then you’d see a Jack Russell go trotting over, jump into the water, cool down for a sec, then hop out, shake off, and trot away.
Ash Can
@John Cole:
Can you imagine the high hilarity if he had tried? That would have made for some damn funny audio.
blogenfreude
@jcricket: Indeed I did. Wishful thinking, eh what?
MNPundit
@MNPundit: Thanks Cole.
@J.: Our cat just loved it on his own. We use it on him in the bathtub.
JenJen
I’m not sure what Reihan Salam is smoking, but I sure would like a toke:
Bush-Cheney 2012?
No need to clean your eyewear or shake the cobwebs out of your head… you read correctly. Salam thinks Jeb Bush is the GOP’s best chance of beating Obama in 2012, and believes there’s a solid chance Cheney could join the ticket. He even claims Jeb has “the raw brainpower and rhetorical skill to match Barack Obama.” Seriously. He really does say that.
AhabTRuler
Right now I am helping two pieces of Welsh Rarebit go galt in Ahab’s
GulletGulch.cleek
@J.:
just use it when they come to see you. they might be a little freaked-out at first, but they’ll grow to love it.
Dreggas
@John Cole:
My experience in talking to others who have had Boston Terriers is they are pretty good with cats, pretty much any dog can be so long as you get them when they are young enough for the cat to beat some sense into them.
Oh and they snortle.
J.
Thanks MNPundit and cleek! For some reason, I’ve been a little nervous about FURminating them. (May have something to do with John Cole’s comment about his HEPA being on suicide watch when he used it on Tunch.)
LD50
@JenJen:
I kept expecting some acknowledgement of satire in there, like when Hunter S. Thompson came out with his NIXON IN ’88: HE’S TANNED, RESTED AND READY. But, uh, gulp, I think he might be serious.
This was cute, BTW; RS first claims this:
Then, as proof, he cites this:
…further proof that the word ‘elitist’ has long since had all the meaning pounded out of it.
schrodinger's cat
If Salam and Douthat are the most promising “conservative intellectuals” how stupid do the least promising have to be?
UnkyT
That’s my little dog in a bucket. Her name is Kaya and she is a sweet little Boston Terrier/English Bulldog mix who is obviously pretty fond of bath time. We got her when she was 8 weeks old, and she spent week 9 of her life at the animal hospital coming close to death from the effects of having both parvo and a broken jaw. She was a tough little puppy though and now has a nice long life of leisure ahead of her.
JenJen
@LD50: I realize The Daily Beast is about as bad as it gets when it comes to Headline Whorin’ For Hits, but Reihan Salam really does win the prize, doesn’t he?
Not only was Poppy Bush humiliated in his bid for reelection in 1992, Dubya lost by 500,000 votes in 2000, and in 2004, the Democrats really did come about as close to defeating a war time president as one could imagine. And of course, in 2008, the Obama campaign essentially ignored McCain-Palin and just ran the show as if Bush-Cheney were seeking a third term. By 9 million votes, the American people agreed. Yet the writer thinks running an actual Bush-Cheney against Obama-Biden is a winner? I mean, OK… maybe if it’s Opposite Day?
That is some hellacious chronic Salam is puffing and I will reiterate: Don’t bogart that joint, Reihan!!
@schrodinger’s cat:
Joe Scarborough, Pat Buchanan, Tucker Carlson, and now, Reihan Salam, strike me as the immediate, most stupid and least promising; am I missing anyone?
sgwhiteinfla
Why is Mike Steele on my Tee Vee?
amorphous
@Ash Can: Too late, they were already whining about it on Fox this morning.
JenJen
@sgwhiteinfla: I think it’s GOP Platform Day, and they’re going to vote on whether to re-brand “The Democrat Party” to “The Socialist Democrat Party.” Not kidding, I swear I read that somewhere.
@UnkyT: I’m so glad you sent Kaya’s photo to John. You and she have made our day, you know!!
The Saff
@ J
I started FURminating my cats last week and they act like they did with their old brush. My 10 year olds usually purr when I brush them. My 11 month old kitten doesn’t want to sit still long enough so I can brush him.
@ UnkyT
Beautiful dog. I’m so glad she is now living the life every dog and cat deserves.
And no Bush should ever be allowed to run for any office again, let alone President of the United States.
Joshua Norton
I’m going to start my own robo-calling business. Extended lifetime warranty for your pets! Can’t miss.
Tsulagi
Yeah, that’s pretty good. It’s like he’s kicking back in his own private Rubbermaid hot tub with one paw out. All he needs is a drink in that paw while watching some doggie porn to complete the look.
Woody
John–Re: Bostons
The cats can take care of themselves, I’m sure…Tunch is substantial. Even a small cat could easily keep a furious boston at bay at need…Bostons don’t get over about 15 lb, and they aren’t aggressive, instinctively. They’re basically a toy breed, nor instinctive ratters or predators. Bred as pets…They’re sweet…in many ways, especially the little ones, are a lot LIKE cats… they’ll be found on the sofa back more often than the cushions. They sometimes have breathing issues, but that’s an in-breeding thing…I’m sure there are boston rescue societies, most places…
i’ll e-mail this to you, too…
Trollhattan
@ UnkyT
That’s some story your li’l pup has. Here’s to that long life o’ leisure.
I’m a little troubled over the, er, mechanics of a Boston terrier-English bulldog cross, but I suppose I’ve heard of weirder ones.
reid
If for some strange reason I had some sympathy for Steele, it’s all gone. He actually said something like “Nancy Pelosi, who no one likes…”. Maybe he thought he was being cute, but I couldn’t help but think it was a dickish thing to say. There was a lot of other nonsense, too, of course. I think he thinks he’s inspiring the GOPers….
LD50
How pathetic is Steele? He wants to channel Tom Delay, and he’s too incompetent to pull it off.
Keith G
@J.: Re: furminator….One of my girls took to it immediately. The other, not so much. I think she was a little put off by the slight pulling sensation.
I began using very little downward pressure on her so I imagine it felt like a reg brush.
Now when I get it out, they run over and compete for first. Funny kitties.
UnkyT
@Trollhattan:
I had a friend when I was young whose mother was pushing 400 lbs and whose father was 130, at most. The first time I saw Kaya’s father(boston terrier) and mother(english bulldog) I couldn’t help but laugh at the similarities.
R-Jud
Like another poster upthread I saw the Boston Terrier and thought, “It’s the Tom Tomorrow dog!”
And now for something completely different: are there any Juicers out there with experience of house-husbanding, or maybe a situation where both members of a couple work at home? My husband and I are looking in to this as an option for us– me working full-time from home, him being home full-time to look after the baby and possibly work for me on the side, or take a few courses to do something else (he has 14 yrs on me and is having a mild mid-life crisis).
Everyone we know thinks it is a good idea, but none of them actually have experience with this situation.
Master Mahan
galt cat iz destroying society
only look like sleep
donovong
@R-Jud: Been there, done that. Although my wifey and I have been married for almost 35 years (and since I am only 39, that was tough!) the end result was not too un-pleasant, but I STRONGLY SUGGEST that you take into consideration whether you can stand each other for such a prolonged period. There’s a big difference between being together for 3-4 hours a day (awake), and being together 24/7/365.
Having avoided all the mid-life crisis stuff, I can’t relate, but having the sanity and financial equilibrium of your household dependent on one source of income is a losing proposition. Just my two cents worth.
MNPundit
@Keith G: Indeed, our cat demands furmination every evening, so now we withold it from him if he was too much of a shitbox that day.
BDeevDad
Just waiting for the pundit to ask why Obama is calling himself loud.
R-Jud
@donovong:
That’s what gives me pause about this option (and thanks for replying). Even though it would work out as a net gain in income if he quits– the child care bill will eat his entire salary, and without child care I am not earning all that I could be–I am loath to put all our eggs in one basket, financially speaking.
If proximity becomes an issue, though, I can always make an “office” of the local coffee shop.
BDeevDad
@R-Jud: We have a few friends that do this. Husbands work at home while wives are with the kids. One thing that makes it work is when husband is working, he is not home and not available. Otherwise, there are too many distractions and excuses for interruptions and work does not get done.
Third Eye Open
I saw this while slummin @ RS. They are seriously slippin’. Can anyone in the class tell me what kind of health insurance Senators have? Anyone? Anyone?
Check out this stupid shit
vacuumslayer
This kitten is going Galt…and stopping to smell the roses. Yet, I don’t want to smack her. Wonder why.
BTW, totally cute pets people.
Wile E. Quixote
@JenJen
Is it drugs, or neurosyphilis? I mean look at all of the crazy shit that Nietzsche wrote when the spirochetes were eating through his brain. That being said Jeb isn’t as stupid as Dubya was, I attribute this to the fact that Barbara Bush probably didn’t try to abort him by drinking three quarts of Gordon’s Gin and smoking a carton of unfiltered Camels every day during her pregnancy with him like she was during Dubya’s.
Steve V
It seems to me that when John starts the day with a “I got nothing”/”not in the mood” post he inevitably ends up posting like crazy later in the day, sometimes within minutes of the “not in the mood” post. (I haven’t run the numbers or anything to confirm this.)
Colette
@R-Jud:
Monsieur Colette and I do this – he retired when our son arrived 5 years ago, and I’m the bacon-bringer-homer. Overall, it’s been great for all of us, especially for my son, who is very tight with his dad. I tried splitting my time between working at home and the office for the first couple of months, but the distractions were overwhelming and I couldn’t get a damned thing done, so I went back to the office full-time. Maybe it would work better if you have a house big enough to have an isolated office area.
Opie Curious
Not sure if anyone has linked to this here or not, but are you people familiar with cat yodeling? If any felines are going Galt, it’s these guys.
Wile E. Quixote
@Trollhattan
I’ve always wondered if someone has ever crossbred a Chihuahua with a Saint Bernard. I mean it’s pretty obvious that the Chihuahua would have to be the sire and the Saint Bernard the dam and I also think that you’d have to use artificial insemination (although the thought of an otherwise unaware Saint Bernard placidly ambling about with a maniacal Chihuahua attached to her backside furiously pumping away is an amusing one). What would you end up with? A dog the size of a Saint Bernard that was incredibly yappity and hyper or a dog the size of a Chihuahua that drooled a lot?
Litlebritdifrnt
Haven’t read all the comments yet but the third shot of the seemingly disassembled collection of cat parts is my boy Max, who sort of disassembled himself in an effort to sleep in the shoebox where I keep my envelopes full of seeds which is on my work table where I frame all my photographs (hence the brown paper, gloo, and paper cutters etc).
Litlebritdifrnt
@UnkyT:
She is just precious and bless you for being her rescuer, broken jaws are nasty things, my cat Alpha had one and despite the wiring it still set crooked so now she is the ugliest most beautiful cat in the world. Bless you.
Laura W
@Steve V: Yes, this “I’m so burned out I can not bear to type another letter” syndrome of John’s has been duly noted (and duly ridiculed) by several commenters.
As recently as yesterday when the first “I’m Outta Here, Suckers” post went up.
You can start at #67 if you like. JasonF is on top of the number crunching.
Some Random Chick
I’m a little late to the party, but I wanted to add my border terrier going Galt with his girlfriend, the brindle American mastiff.
I am a little confused as to correct nomenclature here. Neither of the dogs are producing, so Galt applies. However, there is some cuddling/sharing of comfort. So, can you go Galt and act like a socialist at the same time?
I mean, isn’t “Galt’s Gulch” essentially a DFH-type commune? It’s been years since I attempted to read that doorstop (and I admit, I never did make it all the way through, despite numerous attempts).
So maybe I misremember/misunderstand the big finale. Did the creative class form a commune or not?
asiangrrlMN
@Some Random Chick: Awwww, your dogs are so cute–much cuter than rightwingnutters! I never read the damn book, so I can’t answer your question, but your dogs look way too happy to be goin’ Galt.
Meanderthal
@Woody:
Someone forgot to mention that to my own Boston Terror, who tips the scales at about 25-26 lbs. He’s old now, but is not especially overweight; there’s still substantial muscle there, and as a younger dog, his acceleration was truly terrifying.
He’s also deaf as a post (from birth, as far as we can tell; he was a found dog), and amazingly mellow. Snarflin’ little beast, he is. Snores like a chainsaw.
They’re great dogs. They do have some breathing issues, thanks to the short snout, and are prone to overheating, so they’re not really summertime dogs.