she acts like we never have met

AIM IM between BDylan31 and jrecords_aliciakeys - 11:51 AM

BDylan31: r u going to buy my album?
jrecords_aliciakeys: who is this?
jrecords_aliciakeys: oh, i see. um...
BDylan31: im going to eat a sandwich
jrecords_aliciakeys: i'll get a copy
jrecords_aliciakeys: i don't buy records anymore
jrecords_aliciakeys: no time for shopping!
BDylan31: records dont sound good anyway
jrecords_aliciakeys: i know what u mean sometimes
jrecords_aliciakeys: what kind of sandwich you eatin'
BDylan31: no food in my house
BDylan31: borrowed bread from charley patton
BDylan31: charley patton dont bake no more
BDylan31: said can i borrow yr bread
BDylan31: he said how much i said a sandwich
BDylan31: he said one slice or four
jrecords_aliciakeys: yeah
BDylan31: thats true some of the time
jrecords_aliciakeys: who's charley patton?
BDylan31: just a guy
BDylan31: are you alone?
jrecords_aliciakeys: i'm on tour
jrecords_aliciakeys: you know
jrecords_aliciakeys: surrounded by people
jrecords_aliciakeys: but also alone =(
BDylan31: yr pretty
jrecords_aliciakeys: blushing!!!!
BDylan31: we should tour together
jrecords_aliciakeys: yeah
BDylan31: you like tourin?
jrecords_aliciakeys: its aight
jrecords_aliciakeys: = alright
BDylan31: my daddy was a tourin man
jrecords_aliciakeys: he was?
BDylan31: he was always on the road
jrecords_aliciakeys: my dad wuz Jamaican
BDylan31: my daddy was a tourin man
BDylan31: always on the road
jrecords_aliciakeys: must have been hard
BDylan31: momma never liked him none
BDylan31: she jus bit her tongue and sewed
BDylan31: he sold suitcase soap and lemonade
BDylan31: lost ten bucks for every sale
jrecords_aliciakeys: oh
BDylan31: he sold suitcase soap and lemonade
BDylan31: lost ten bucks for every sale
jrecords_aliciakeys: too funny
BDylan31: one day he came home
BDylan31: said i sold my way to jail
jrecords_aliciakeys: brb

storm warnings

Some excerpts from our award-winning coverage of Hurricane Katrina last year:

• August 26 - NEW ORLEANS - I've been down to investigate the levees that protect this city from floods and they look about as fragile and vulnerable as the current peace on border between Lebanon and Israel. I doubt either will last more than a year... Also, I think the racially charged film Crash will be a surprise winner at the next Academy Awards, beating out the currently unreleased but sure to be an Oscar favorite, Brokeback Mountain... I'm suspicious of books written by younger authors -- every time a freshman at college, even a highly regarded school like Harvard ever publishes a book, I suggest checking to see if they might have plagiarized it from the kinds of books someone that age might have read: Megan McCafferty's Second Helpings or Meg Cabot's The Princess Diaries come to mind... but anyway, this Katrina's going to be a big storm here in New Orleans in late summer 2005.
• August 31 - NEW ORLEANS - Just overheard Anderson Cooper in an argument with his producer: "If you think I'm wading into that cesspool, you're a f**king moron. I'm a Vanderbilt, not some rinkydink local weatherman looking to make a name for himself." Then, a little later, things got even more heated: "I swear to chr*st, if you mention 'The Mole' one more time, I will slap you into next week. You think I won't do it? Try me, m***erf**ker. I haven't slept in two days and I've got a space on my mantel set aside for a CNN segment producer's neck. By the way, my mantel is f**king huge! It's a Vanderbilt mantel, you a**hole."
• September 2 - NEW ORLEANS - Guess who just made love in an abandoned refrigerator on Bourbon Street? I'll give you a hint. It was me.

notes from the photo shop

To: Editors, Reporters and Staff at ***** Herald-News

From: Photo Department

In case anyone is wondering why we have NO PHOTO accompanying our top story about the JonBenet Ramsey case, it is because of RAMPANT VANDALISM in our photo archives that has finally GONE TOO FAR!!

We have recently switched to a digital archiving system, which will prevent this sort of thing, but many of our older photographs are irreparably damaged. Our editorial team did not think it would be appropriate, for instance, to print a picture of JonBenet Ramsey with a handle-bar moustache and a thought bubble reading "I love c**k." Unfortunately, that is the only photo we have of her at this time. Because ONE OF YOU felt the need to destroy the archival pictures.

Also, you may have noticed that we are only running contemporary pictures of Fidel Castro lately. That is because our older photos are all marred by what can only be described as a "Z.Z. Top" beard drawn with a Sharpie, many featuring text bubbles with song lyrics like "Give me all your lovin, all your hugs and kisses too." There's one picture of Castro during the Bay of Pigs with a long beard and a word balloon reading "She's got legs! Sheer Energy legs!" which I feel compelled to point out ISN'T EVEN A Z.Z. TOP SONG but the lyrics to a COMMERCIAL JINGLE based on one of their songs. Please tell me how you think readers will react if CASTRO DIES and we run an obituary accompanied by a photo of Che Guevaro and Fidel Castro with FUZZY CARTOON GUITARS singing "We've got to double back my friend!" (an obscure track from the Recycler album)???

Furthermore, drawing devil horns on ANY POLITICIAN is considered UNACCEPTABLE. And once you've done that, is it really neccesary to add a word balloon that says "I'm the devil"? I mean, that's just overdoing it. We could airbrush out the horns, and even the fake tail drawn behind his head, but that word balloon over Joe Lieberman's face means we CAN'T USE THE PHOTO.

Just because a photo is old doesn't mean we will never print it again. How would YOU FEEL if somebody VANDALIZED your old family photos? For instance, what if you woke up tomorrow and every picture of your grandfather suddenly had a Hitler moustache? (Heinrich, for the sake of this thought exercise, imagine that someone has REMOVED the Hitler moustaches from your family portraits.) I think we can ALL AGREE this would be HORRIBLE. Well just remember that every portrait in our archive is somebody's relative and SOMEBODY WHO IS NEWSWORTHY at some point.

If you want to be a cartoonist so badly, contact Tom in the editorial department or Meg in the funny pages. This is a NEWS ROOM.

PS: Please do not respond to this memo by drawing on the baby picture of me on the Employee Fun Bulletin Board. I KNOW I HAD PERFECT UNBLEMISHED SKIN AS AN INFANT AND I WILL BE WATCHING YOU!!!

grass roots

The Financial Times, August 14, 2006:
AUTHOR DEFENDS HIS SECRECY OVER SS MEMBERSHIP
Günter Grass, the Nobel prize-winning author who for decades served as Germany's postwar conscience, was struggling on Monday to retain some of his moral authority, as historians, writers and politicians criticised his decision to keep hidden for 60 years his membership of the Waffen SS, part of Hitler's elite military force.

Grass is not the only acclaimed author to have a seemingly incongruous party affiliation in his past. A partial list follows:

• Gabriel Garcia Marquez. A Nobel laureate like Grass, as a young journalist, Garcia Marquez co-founded the Practical Realists Convention and also was a member of the Coalition To Prevent Sexual Congress During Times of Cholera.
• Toni Morrison. Nobel Prize winning author of "Beloved," "Paradise," "Jazz," "Love" and "Sula" once belonged to Librarians In Support of Multi-Word Titles on Books.
  
• Joyce Carol Oates. Belonged to Environmentalists Dedicated To Preserving Paper.
  
• Norman Mailer. Worked as spokesperson for United Parcel Service.
• Gao Xingjian. Despite being born in 1940 and being Chinese, this 2000 Nobel Prize winner also served in the Nazi Schutzstaffel with Grass.
  
• David Foster Wallace. The author of "Infinite Jest" and "Oblivion" was once a member of The Society For Prevention Of Pretentious Assholes Carrying Around Copies Of Books They've Never Read And Using Them To Impress Girls I Like, And I'm Amazed The Girls Fall For It As Often As They Do.
  

thwarts and all

The British airplane explosives plot is only one of a number of recent plots that have been disrupted by authorities:

1. Operation Doomsday Touchdown: Islamic fundamentalists, working in conjunction with North Korean scientists, used hypnosis and brainwash techniques to turn an American citizen from Ohio into a sleeper agent/assassin trained to gun down citizens with an AK-47. Plot was foiled when police arrested Maurice Clarett on August 9.
2. Operation Pipeline of Destruction: Industrial petroleum experts from the Middle East plotted to introduce poisonous additives into America's oil network, which, when burned as fuel, would create lethal gas clouds. Crisis was averted when BP, notified by CIA operatives, shut down the targeted pipeline from Prudhoe Bay, using "corrosion" as a cover story.
3. Operation Maximum Overdrive II: Technicians working under the diabolical instructions of Hugo Chavez developed the capability to turn household appliances into killing machines via coded messages sent on radio frequencies. A trial run in Queens, New York, was disrupted by authorities who promptly shut down the electrical grid and arrested the conspirators. Due to the ongoing threat, the electrical grid has not yet been fully restored.
   
4. Operation Fatal Friday (and its alternate plans Murder Monday, Trauma Tuesday and Wiring-Is-Faulty Wednesday): Hezbollah operatives attempted to crush the American spirit by killing its sweetheart, actress Lindsay Lohan, in what would appear to be an industrial accident on the set of her film Georgia Rule, thereby also ruining the image of trade unions and machinists who allowed her to perish. Homeland Security agents dressed as enthusiastic teen party-goers forced the actress to wear herself down at late night social events, so that she was too exhausted to report to the film set on the days scheduled for her murder.
5. Operation The Martry They Come, The Martyr They Fall: Anti-Christian fundamentalists planned an attack to coincide with Hezbollah's "Fatal Friday" mission, in which famed Catholic leader Mel Gibson would be assassinated by men dressed as Orthodox Jews, thereby sparking a religious war that would engulf the USA. FBI agents put Mr. Gibson in protective custody. (NOTE: This took place after he entered rehab. His drunken arrest and anti-Semitic comments were unrelated to the plot or its disruption by government officials.)
6. Operation Devious Middlesex: French saboteurs, angry about the situation in Lebanon, aimed to kidnap American atheletes and force them into potentially humiliating gender-reassignment surgery, thereby destroying the symbolic "manhood" of the United States. Plot ineffective due to naturally high testosterone levels of American athletes.
   

al qaeda is gellin'

The New York Times, August 10, 2006:
PLOT TO BOMB JETS IS THWARTED IN BRITAIN
In the United States, federal officials put in place new regulations barring passengers from carrying any liquids, gels or lotions onto planes, except for baby formula or prescription medicines.

Authorities are especially on the lookout for passengers with travel-size bottles of Pert Plus 3-in-1 (shampoo/conditioner/c-4).

what you want to do fine

The Washington Post, August 9, 2006:
WAR CRIMES ACT CHANGES WOULD REDUCE THREAT OF PROSECUTION
The Bush administration has drafted amendments to a war crimes law that would eliminate the risk of prosecution for political appointees, CIA officers and former military personnel for humiliating or degrading war prisoners, according to U.S. officials and a copy of the amendments.

Write It Like Disaster has obtained a copy of the amendments:

Amendment 1: The Geneva Conventions should only apply to soldiers operating in Geneva, Switzerland. To pick an example at random, a CIA operative with blonde hair whose initials were C. M. could order the electro-shock treatment of a prisoner in Baghdad and would not be subject to criminal charges for such action.

Amendment 2: Acts previously deemed illegal as "deliberately humiliating" will now be deemed legal. In case any soldiers are unclear about what those acts might be, here are some suggestions: forced nakedness, use of dog collars, and wearing of women's underwear by men are all humilitiang. For more ideas, do a Google search of "fetish" and "sexual acts." Try mixing and matching different techniques. Be creative! The only limit is your imagination.

Amendment 3: We're adding a "g" to the War Crimes Act, which previously outlawed violations of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. It is now called the "GWAR Crimes Act" and only makes it a crime for members of the band GWAR to violate Common Article 3. (NOTE: This only applies to the current lineup of the band and not former members like Joey Slutman, Slymenstra Hyman, Stephen Sphincter, or Cornelius Carnage.)

Amendment 4: If Attorney General Alberto Gonzales tells you something is illegal but winks at you with his left eye when he says it, go ahead and do whatever you were talking about doing.

desire lines

Hezbollah has expressed its desire to remove Israel from the map, which is a major obstacle to peace in the region. Below are some other countries that are wished off the map.

Target Country: North Korea
Country Wishing to Destroy it: South Korea
Reason: Worried about refugee influx due to starvation and police-state in North; tired of having to sign for misdelivered packages.

Target Country: Sweden
Country Wishing to Destroy it: Brazil
Reason: Too many Swedes; furniture often difficult to assemble.

Target Country: Italy
Country Wishing to Destroy it: Mexico
Reason: Finally saw Roberto Benigni's Pinocchio.

Target Country: Ethiopia
Country Wishing to Destroy it: Somalia
Reason: Interferes with self-government; wins too many marathons.

Target Country: Iran
Country Wishing to Destroy it: United States
Reason: Is developing nuclear weapons; may have oil.

Target Country: France
Country Wishing to Destroy it: France
Reason: Existential malaise.

joetic champions compose

WINNERS OF THE JOE LIEBERMAN POETRY CHALLENGE
Winners receive year-long subscription to Write It Like Disaster.

HAIKU DIVISION
(Cleopatra M., Louisiana)

Gossamer feelings
Nasal voice like droning bees
Forward Joementum

BEAT DIVISION
(excerpt)
(Peter C., Ohio)

I saw the melted road to the future and the approaching tongue of the redwhiteblue leader,
who kissed my cheek before the crowd, who dripped approval on me in the marble Capitol,
who studied coke and booze in universities and flew American skies til war's end,
who read books to babies under burning towers asking men to bring it on,
who choked on war and preztels, joked on newspaper menwomen, smoked out of spider holes hairy-faced men in sand countries...

IMAGIST DIVISION
(Rober P., San Diego)

this is just to say

i have voted
for ned lamont
who was in
the primary

and who
you were probably
hoping
to defeat

Forgive me
he was so democratic
anti-war
and not you

kidz corner

Today's entry consists of submissions from some of our younger readers.

Q: Knock knock.
A: Who's there?
Q: Interrupting Mel Gibson.
A: Interrupting Mel Gibs...
Q: JEWWWWWWWW!!!!

(Darren L., 9 years old, Anti Defamation League Childcare Center, New York)

Q: Why was the Israeli chef mean?
A: Because he beat the eggs, whipped the cream, and dropped bombs on innocent civilians.

(Ali F., 7 years old, Gaza)

PARTISAN PLAYHOUSE!
Some of our young readers get help from their parents or teachers!

Q: Why did Joe Lieberman cross the road?
A: To get to the RNC headquarters.

(James O., 6 years old, DNC Daycare Facility, Washington, D.C.)

Q: Knock knock.
A: Who's there?
Q: The devil.
A: The devil who?
Q: Hillary Clinton.

(Matt W., 6 years old, Republican Preschool Program, Washington, D.C.)

Q: How many Ralph Naders does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: None! Ralph Nader rarely has to change his lightbulbs because he uses energy efficient compact fluorescents.

(Walden J., 12 years old, Green Party Young Minds Thinkcenter, Vermont)

Two bedsheets walk into a bar near Guantanamo Bay. The bartender says "We don't serve your kind in here" and points to a sign that says "No Bedsheets Allowed." The sheets leave and one says to the other, "I guess we're not going to have any drinks." The other says, "I have a plan."

He tears himself into long thin strips and enters a cell in Camp X-Ray. There, he fashions the pieces of himself into a makeshift rope and ties himself into a noose. Then he wraps himself around the neck of a prisoner who was never formally charged with a crime but had been held there for years without access to a lawyer. The sheet chokes the life out of the prisoner until he is dead.

A guard walks by the cell and sees the man hanging by his neck. The guard says, "Wasn't there a prisoner living in here, and shouldn't he have been protected from torture by the Geneva Conventions"? And the sheet says "I'm a frayed knot."

(Tommy B., 14 years old, ACLU Afterschool Program, Washington, D.C.)

live by the code

The Economist, July 29th 2006:
THE SUEZ CRISIS: AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER
On July 26th 1956 Gamal Abdul Nasser, president of Egypt, addressed a huge crowd in the city of Alexandria...
In that speech in Alexandria, though, Nasser chose to delve back ... in a long digression on the building of the Suez canal a century earlier. That gave him the chance to mention the name of the Frenchman who had built the canal, Ferdinand de Lesseps. This he did at least 13 times. "De Lesseps", it turned out, was the codeword for the Egyptian army to start the seizure, and nationalisation, of the canal.

Tips on Selecting A Codeword for Military Action

• Pick something short. Many juntas have failed to take power because overexcited supporters revealed themselves by unveiling machine guns halfway through the too-long codewords. (See Republic of San Lucia, 1973, Colonel Benson Juarez's decision to use "And when the sun, with its red fingered rays, rises tomorrow, it will be over a new land of promise and hope, a land touched by the hand of God, who will wash away the sins of our current leaders and usher in the era of prosperity. All those who support me are called to action by the light of this afternoon.")
• Do not use an important piece of self-identification. If the codeword for your revolt is your Social Security number, and the uprising fails, you will be an easy target for identity theft.
• Don't pick a tongue-twister as your codeword. You've got enough to worry about as it is.
• Avoid being vague, but also don't make your codeword too specific. In Rwanda, the Hutu tribes broadcast coded messages on the radio such as "Them Tutsis are cockroaches and must be killed" and "Cut off the Tutsis' arms with your machetes." These were successful in conveying the information, but were later used against the genocide's perpetrators in court. If you work in a radio station, and are looking for a signal to incite mass murder, pick a hot summer jam, like Lily Allen's "LDN," so you can claim later that you were just playing music.
• Use a word that does not come up in normal conversation or speeches. To emphasize the codeword, pick an unusual word so it will stand out when you say it. But avoid an unusual word that is so silly it will make you laugh. You want your military action to begin with dignity.
• Be sure your codeword has not previously been used as a codeword. You don't want your coup being associated with a failed or evil dictatorship of the past merely because you failed to research your codeword. Avoid German codewords, especially.
  
• Avoid overuse of punctuation. In modern times, many military pushes are planned online. Resist the temptation to create a codeword that uses punctuation you will have trouble conveying, like "Strike!" Although it looks great on paper, during your speech, your underlings might question whether you said "Strike!" or just "Strike" or maybe even "Strike?" For this reason, also, avoid using emoticons as code words to launch your secret attack.
  
• Don't be pretentious. Any idiot with an encylcopedia can find the name of an obscure Roman general or Native American warrior to lend gravitas to their codeword. Resist the temptation, and stick with what you know. Are you trying to impress freshman girls, or start a military dictatorship? Also, don't have your codeword be a Dave Matthews song you learned to play on guitar.
  

miss accomplished

The Washington Post, August 2, 2006:
MUCH UNDONE IN REBUILDING IRAQ, AUDIT SAYS
A flailing Iraq reconstruction effort that has been dominated for more than three years by U.S. dollars and companies is being transferred to Iraqis, leaving them the challenge of completing a long list of projects left unfinished by the Americans.

A Partial List of the Unfinished Projects

1. Christo's Abu Ghrates Exhibition
   
2. Railroad, utilities, waterworks, and free parking facility
   
3. Cleaning up sweets and flowers left in streets during welcome party in 2003
4. Cleaning up mines and IEDs left in streets after welcome party in 2003
5. Sunni skateboard park
6. Shiite skateboard park
7. Kurdish skateboard park
8. Second Green Zone
9. All bridges, metaphorical and otherwise
10. American flag factory

gleaming the cuba

New York Post headlines prepared for possible outcomes to the situation in Cuba

• FIDEL E.R. ON THE ROOF - Possible if the CIA discovers that Fidel Castro's doctors, in order to protect him from other patients, moved him to an operating theater at the top floor of the hospital for his surgery.
• S. CUBA DIVING - Possible if southern Cuba reacts poorly to the temporary transfer of power and conditions there plummet far faster than in the rest of the country.
  
• CASTRO PHYSICS - Possible if, during his intestinal surgery, an apple one of the doctors was eating for lunch falls onto Fidel Castro's head, knocking him into a coma, and international investigators dispute whether the incident was an accident or an act of attempted assassination, relying on the opinions of ballistics experts to verify the trajectory of the apple in question.
  
• CUBA LIVRE - Possible if the bleeding near his intestines is discovered to be related to a liver disorder. Also, if the O.E.D. changes the spelling of "liver" to "livre."
• BAY OF PICKS - Possible if Castro dies and as a result, Cuba descends into chaos that is unapproachable by boat, to which America responds by airlifting food, as well as some luxury items to make life more satisfying for the people trapped there, including DVD players and DVDs of titles that are on Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert's "The Great Movies" list.
• CHE IT DON'T SPRAY IT - Possible if Raul Castro does not take over the country after Fidel Castro's death, but is instead replaced by Ernesto "Che" Guevara, who has been secretly living on an organic farm in Cuba since he faked his death in 1967 and his first act as Prime Minister is to ban the use of artificial fertilizers and insecticides.
• CUBAN MISS L. CRIES 'YES' - Possible if Fidel Castro dies and popular uprising leads to unprecedented vote to determine whether Cuba will remain communist or become a free-market economy, and then that vote becomes even more historic when it turns out to be an exact tie, with one ballot uncounted because it is unclear whether the voter marked 'yes' or 'no' on the referendum, and the elderly spinster is finally tracked down to her rural home and questioned about her voting intentions, which have historic implications, even while her identity is kept secret by not revealing her last name except for its first letter.
• 'HA' VANNA - Possible if Fidel Castro has a change of heart while recuperating from surgery and decides to open Cuba to the modern world, including American investors and tourists, who initiate the new cultural awakening with a visit from two of the United States' most popular game shows, "Jeopardy!" and "Wheel of Fortune," during which, when an electrical outage causes the wheel to temporarily stop functioning, Vanna White is forced to fill time by entertaining the crowd with her surprisingly funny stand-up routine.