Monday, December 01, 2003

Haven't heard from me? Well, I switched off mail reception from cupcake.com a month or so ago because the spam was becoming intolerable, and I'm too cheap to pay for a decent spam filter. But I just switched it on and it's now downloading 85,497 messages. So, I'll be getting back to you, obviously.

Monday, September 15, 2003

Tuesday, September 02, 2003

"Even though they sat in the wet seats, they were still in high spirits," said Tina Semon the Stand for Children chair. "It was an amazing accomplishment. It shows the American spirit."
Indiana's living flag
Foster, arguing with Daniels's earlier statement, said that the first thing people want is a gun, not Coke or Disney. Anthropologists studying New Guinea highlanders in the 1930s found that while the highlanders thought the phonograph interesting, what they wanted were guns. The second thing everyone wants is a chain saw, he added. (Later, someone in the audience suggested that the reason guns and chain saws were popular is because they are analogues of existing tools.)
(c) Evelyn C. Leeper

Monday, August 18, 2003

Cheese Blackout
"I'm still trying to restock," he said. "I am going to get up very early in the morning and go to New Jersey and get more cheese. We lost hundreds of pounds of cheese. Maybe about $50,000 worth."
New York Post

Friday, August 08, 2003

From the ever-entertaining British Library catalogue:

Must we introduce Monogamy? A study of polygamy on a mission problem in South Africa.
HELANDER. Gunnar
pp. 69. Shuter & Shooter: Pietermaritzburg, 1958. 8o.

Friday, August 01, 2003

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pizza products without tomato sauce, cheese or bread crust can still be sold as pizza under new government regulations, the U.S. Agriculture Department said Thursday.

Friday, July 18, 2003

Not Me
What a shame.

Monday, July 14, 2003

Great Moments in Customer Service #2
Me: You tried to deliver a package just now, but he's put an invalid waybill number on the card.
DHL: What's the route number?
Me: WN06...
DHL: ...Oh blimey, he ain't got a flipping phone. Fat lot of use that is.

Friday, July 11, 2003

Lovely Street Names #2 to #8
    Acting on details provided by an informant, police have seized several dozen street-name signs at a local residence, which allegedly had been stolen by a teenager from street intersections during the past several months.

    The purloined green-and-white signs were stolen from places across town, including Cricket Trail, High Rock Road, Great Ring Road, Chipmunk Trail, Chimney Swift Road, and Poverty Hollow Road, among dozens of others.

Newtown Bee (CT)

That's a matter of opinion

Almonds and pistachios are the only nuts mentioned in the Bible.

Tuesday, July 08, 2003

The dairy area is a gold mine if you love yogurt.
This must be a fertility cocktail:
    IVF Martini

    Into a shaker 2/3 filled with ice add a small (30 ml) shot of absinthe, a small shot of Kahlua, and a large (60 ml) shot of cold (but fresh) espresso (or filter coffee). Shake and strain into a Martini glass, and float a small shot of single cream on top. Garnish with three coffee beans.

ViewLondon

Wednesday, June 25, 2003

Maybe "Truffle" Is Code For "Missile"?
    "Daddy, daddy, look what I found," cries Rana, one of his daughters, running up to Saddam with a truffle in her hand.

The Cape Argus (and everybody else) on Reuters' Saddam Hussein home videos.
Lovely Street Names #1
    Reed slammed into a tree along Pine Products Road as he was trying to outrun a sheriff's deputy.

St Petersburg Times [Florida]
Surprisingly dull compilation of exclamations and arguments (on a bus) caused by spontaneous traffic-related nudity in Nigeria.

Tuesday, June 24, 2003

"So. What about Tim?"

Wednesday, June 18, 2003

Mustn't-Haves #342
Inside was a set of beautiful, hand crafted metal and wood hot dog sticks! [...]They're very affordable and come in a beautiful cloth case.
Writers Weekly

Monday, June 16, 2003

She waited through the courses until the end when her pungent surprise was brought out. Floating in the bowl of soup were gelatinous rubber band shapes.

Yeltsin paused dramatically before announcing: "Moose lips."

from Hillary Clinton's memoirs, apparently.

Friday, June 13, 2003

Great Moments in Customer Service
Us: Our milk delivery hasn't come today.
Dairy Crest: Yeah, Sean's been really unreliable lately.

Thursday, June 12, 2003

6:30 am - Jump on the computer and type in a few names I dreamed up during the night for a new agricultural herbicide. After 21 years of full-time freelancing, I do this work in my sleep!
Star Lawrence, a real star.

Wednesday, June 04, 2003

DISGRACED doctor Jack Freeman claimed about $670,000 for services he never provided in a sophisticated bulk-billing fraud, a court heard yesterday. [...]The biggest item in the fraud was $388,113.50 Freeman claimed for treating 3595 in-grown toenails. On average, Victorian GPs treated only 19 in that period.

Herald Sun [Australia], 16 May 2003

PS: They mean doctors in Victoria, not doctors from the reign of Queen Victoria. Sheesh.

Tuesday, May 13, 2003

What kind of a name is "Stakeknife"? If I was a double agent, I'd want a cool name like "Mellon Baller".

Tuesday, May 06, 2003

"I was at a party in Oakland last weekend with some friends," Sabathia said, "and several of them said that I should raise the pants legs and expose the socks."
The Journal of the American Mosquito Control Association reported that drinking beer and other alcoholic beverages increases a person's appeal to mosquitoes. Mosquitoes also love socks and limburger cheese.

Washington Post, 6 May 2003

· Now that you are supporting art projects, perhaps you can help with my latest conceptual masterwork? I intend to place a little blue bag of plain crisps in a deserted salt mine. Which won't come cheap, believe me. If it helps, I can arrange for the crisps to be naked.
Paul May

The Guardian, 3 May 2003

Friday, May 02, 2003

· Why is internet domain name registrar Network Solutions one of the world's least loved companies? It's a long story - a reputation like that is not gained overnight, some real effort has to be put in. Like randomly freezing an internet address for a year, as happened to reader Paul May's cupcake.com site, and then - after a stream of pleas and complaints - unfreezing it without a word of explanation or apology. An illustration of the company is seen in the case of the person who recently found a blank, signed cheque from Network Solutions blowing around on the pavement near Liverpool Street railway station in London. Being an honest type, the finder contacted Network Solutions, and after some effort managed to speak to someone, who told him not to bother. He duly destroyed the cheque, but others might not have been so honest.

Right on. The Guardian, 2 May 2003

Thursday, May 01, 2003

Dire advertising, masquerading as local news:
And while you wait, check out The Cheese Shop's eclectic selection of sodas or browse through their candies from around the world [...] The Cheese Shop is a deli with a difference.
Enter into the world of LCD technology with the generous features of the AL511 which enhances the standard office desktop workplace fulfilling the needs of office workers or professionals working in the creative industry enjoying the outstanding performance of a modern TFT Display for a guaranteed return on investment.
Ad in DABS catalogue

Thursday, March 20, 2003

Cupcake Canasta will return in full glory to www.cupcake.com on 1 May 2003...

Wednesday, February 26, 2003

Tuesday, February 25, 2003

Poor Gephardt: put a microphone in front of him and he sounds like he's trying to climb the down escalator. He also has the coloring and demeanor of macaroni and cheese. Recently, he compared himself to a pair of old sneakers.
Time

Wednesday, February 12, 2003

The Mecca bingo name is derived from the Mecca Smoking Cafe, which opened in London in 1884.
David Backhouse

Wednesday, February 05, 2003

My other role is I'm on the volunteer fire department in Tomales, where I live. Here I'm surrounded by women who are passionate about cheese, and there I'm surrounded by men who care nothing about cheese.
Cheesemonger Kate Arding in the San Francisco Chronicle

Tuesday, February 04, 2003

Friday, January 31, 2003

Thursday, January 30, 2003

For my tombstone:
Occasional profanity, sexual candor and comic vulgarity; fleeting nudity, with a facetious emphasis.
Typical movie synopsis from the early 21st century.

Wednesday, January 22, 2003

Trivet Trivia Time
Here is a fascinating project from MIT:
This project includes an understanding of oven cooking practices in an oven mitt by designing it to remark verbally on its temperature. The Talking Trivet uses a thermoresistor to remark on the temperature of foods and containers which are placed on it. For example, it exclaims "FIRE!" when left on a surface ove 600 degrees, informs you that the food "Needs rewarming." or affirms that the food is "Hot and ready to eat!". In addition, it sets an automatic timer for cooking which is based on the temperature of the oven. Therefore, a 275 degree oven exclaims that the food should be checked in 40 minutes, whiles a 500 degree oven recommends that it should be tested in 10 minutes.
You heard it here last: this story is vintage July '99:
PASTA GOES CYBER
You heard it here first: A British e-deli has invented a new pasta shape...
the "@", also known as La Chiocciola. According to Best Fratello, the
producer, the pasta has been accepted at the National Museum of Pasta Foods
in Rome (http://www.professionalpasta.it/). The museum chose to add this
shape because it "successfully combines a long-standing tradition of
handicraft pasta making, with a creative shape and the crafted inventiveness
of a modern 'pasta master'." See this pasta for yourself: either buy a
package or order a sample-- you will receive a single handsomely wrapped
piece. A perfect addition to a cybermeal could be the Pasta Shoppe's
"Surfin' the Net" pasta, which features little computers in orange and
natural colors!
Get your "@" pasta sample or package at:
http://www.thebestraffaello.com/uk/cyberpasta.htm
Purchase the "Surfin' the Net" pasta at:
http://goshoppingonline.bfast.com/goshoppingonline/click?sourceid=970674&bfp
id=14_NET700&bfmtype=14
VirtualItalia.com


What I really want is pasta shaped like the Enron "E".

Sarah Ferguson, interviewed on a visit to Milwaukee:

Q. Is this your first time to Milwaukee? Are you planning to sample any of Milwaukee's delicacies, like beer and bratwurst? Or are you going to eat more sensible fare while you're here?

A. I've been here before. I like Wisconsin. We like the cheese curds. Where are the cheese curds? I haven't seen a cheese curd in sight (looking over to a nearby buffet). I won't do beer and bratwurst, but I would quite like to try a cheese curd. We like the fried cheese curds. As usual, (the food during her visit) will be quite sensible. (She rolls her eyes.)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 20 January 2003

Thursday, January 09, 2003

John Lennon Goes Mobile
Moviso announced mobile content licensing deals that make celebrity graphics, animation and sound effects available for mobile devices worldwide. Moviso is also the first company to make John Lennon photographs and graphics available to the mobile market. Moviso is working with a range of content companies to deliver the broadest selection of mobile media content worldwide to both carriers and consumers directly.
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