Someone just called me on my mobile and asked me if I deal in firearms.

Jailed on a sandwich beef

A New Hampshire man has been in jail for the last three weeks after allegedly stealing a roast beef sandwich. '"He said he was on his way back to pay for the sandwich," said [Portsmouth Police Officer Michael] Maloney. ' The sandwich was competitively priced at $3.99.

Portsmouth Herald, 19 May 2005.

Happy Meals for Adults

How come these don't exist? I'd like to be offered a little action figure with my food, to keep me distracted. How about Jack and Miles out of Sideways? Or - and this more likely - John and Jane from Mr & Mrs Smith? I can also imagine Bourne tie-in meals, presented in "Treadstone" themed boxes. I want this much more than I want... salads.

"Shoehorse"!?

RZT: You're a self-proclaimed shoehorse. Who is your favorite shoe designer?

JB [Julien Boutter]: I like Paul May shoes, and all Italian shoes in general.

Row Z Tennis

Amazon.com's Statistically Improbable Phrases, or "SIPs", show you the interesting, distinctive, or unlikely phrases that occur in the text of books in Search Inside the Book. Our computers scan the text of all books in the Search Inside program. If they find a phrase that occurs a large number of times in a particular book relative to how many times it occurs across all Search Inside books, that phrase is a SIP in that book.
Amazon.com

Example:
chiller room from My First Movie: Twenty Celebrated Directors Talk About Their First Film by Stephen Lowenstein.

Double Take

Is it just me, or does this sentence make you feel itchy?

"His appointment as president of the Bluegrass Press Club was the public icing on the cake."

George Clooney: a biography, by Jeff Hudson, page 10.

Haunted Cheese Factory

Decatur - Adams County Cheese factory - This old abandoned cheese factory, has been known for its many unexplained phenomena. It is said to be guarded by spirits. Many people claim not to be able to spend much time in this area.

Landon Howell, Juiceenewsdaily.com, 4 April 2005.

"Elvis Presley" is the phonetic equivalent in Hungarian of "the lost pretzel".

Joe Esterhaz, Hollywood Animal

Cupcake Canasta has returned to the web, (not) fresh from its battles with domain registrars and (nearly) ready to recommence regular updates. Thanks to everyone who's supported the site during the wilderness years - and welcome back. Plans are underway for a massive celebration in December when the site reaches its tenth anniversary. That's right: Cupcake Canasta is only five months younger than Amazon.

Isn't the phrase normally "to die for"? Maybe they mean "Advance 007".

>> Advance7 has a 15-year track record of success and a customer list to kill for. This is an ideal role for an ambitious sales person with IT experience.
http://www.top-consultant.com/UK/career/appointmentsthree.asp?ID=9718

Samsung boss who wants to ski alone hires his own slope

[...]“He is afraid of falling and being run into...”

The Times, 17 March 2005.

John Harwood: lunch tab of $6,670.45.

l’Affaire de Crudite

Former House speaker John Harwood ordered up more than $6,000 worth of pricey eats, and another $500 worth of beer, wine and other beverages to wash it down, at a reception for what he estimated would be 175 people attending the unveiling of his official portrait at the Statehouse last April. The total tab, according to court papers, came to $6,670.45.

Now, Harwood is saying current House Speaker William Murphy backed out on a promise to pay for the fancy victuals -- $1,916.25 just for the passed-around hors d’oeuvres -- and is suing him in District Court.

[...]Exactly how much is it going to cost Joe Taxpayer to adjudicate l’Affaire de Crudite?

Woonsocket Call, 14 March 2005.

Nothing I Can Do About It

As the ocean containers left Marion, it seemed the city's spirit would sag. "There's nothing I can do about it," Williams said shortly after he was laid off. "This is politics, business, the way of the world."
Indianapolis Star, 13 March 2005.

''It's my life. It's everything. It's a dream Don and I had. Now we're back at the bottom starting all over,'' says Newssbaum. Newssbaum says she estimates about $450,000 worth of inventory has burned. ''Nothing I can do about it. Just smile and go on and hope insurance will take care of it,'' adds Inmon.
week.com, 13 March 2005.

"We're a necessary service and function," Elizabethtown Police Chief Ruben Gardner said. "We can't deter from that."

Gardner said the department will maintain a force of at least four patrol cars and one supervisor on the road at all times, and could possibly have up to eight cars on the road during peak hours.

"There's nothing I can do about it," he said about gasoline prices.
News-Enterprise, Kentucky, no date.

At her rental, she'll keep the heat turned down and run the dishwasher only once a week.
"That is just the way it is," Hennig said. "There is nothing I can do about it."
Daily Herald, Washington, 11 March 2005.

Cajeta, por favor?
Hershey's new line of candy launched under the moniker of "La Dulceria Thaila" is now out and available at a vending machine near you. Thalia is a very well-known Mexican star, roughly the Hispanic equivalent of Britney Spears. In one of the ads, Thalia appears in this month's People en Espanol touting Hershey's new candy line with a headline that says, "Sabor a chocolate blanco con cajeta." (The taste of white chocolate and condensed milk.) To 60% of the US Hispanic market the word "cajeta," loosely translated, means "condensed milk," which is extremely sweet and sinfully delicious. But to the rest of the Hispanic consumers in the United States it either means nothing or, in the worst of a Marketer's nightmare, it means something that does not belong on a candy wrapper [...] Contact Jose Cancela [of Hispanic USA Inc.] and find out what "cajeta" means to Argentines and Dominicans.
Press release, Hispanic USA 14 March 2005.

Here's some help from The Times-News of Twin Falls, Idaho 8 March 2005:
"... in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and the Dominican Republic, cajeta is a vulgar term for a certain delicate part of the female anatomy."

Damn! I guessed wrong.

Exploding Dog
Not content with posting some of the finest drawings available on the web, sam brown also writes a model faq.

Underground map of London with the locations of various movie settings substituted for stations.

Yum yum

"The flavor and chic style of the brand make this a natural fit for female audiences," said Stephanie Miller, the company's new-products manager.

"This" = Brutal Fruit, an alcoholic malted drink in four flavours: Sultry Strawberry, Kinky Kiwi, Manic Mango and Luscious Litchi.

Richmond Times-Dispatch, 7 March 2005.

Oh, Chris.
"The best way to develop self esteem is to teach children to read and write, to add up and to know something about the world," he [Chris Woodhead, ex-chief inspector of schools] told BBC Radio's Today. BBC, 7 March 2005.

That may be the way you developed your self-esteem, Chris.

Film Studio in Surbiton
The ballroom in Regent House, an old mansion, provided the setting for this one-stage studio formed in 1918 by the Stoll Film Company Limited. Their first production was Comradeship, produced by Maurice Elvey, starring stage actor Gerald Ames and Lily Elsie. By 1920, Stoll had moved to a larger studio at Cricklewood, and cinematographer Geoffrey Malins had formed the Garrick Film Company and was using the Surbiton Studio. Although Malins made a number of comedy films, in the main his productions were shorts and educational films, which included Our Girls And Their Physique. Stoll retained the ownership of the studio until 1923 when it was taken over by British Instructional Films.
Patricia Warren, British Film Studios: an illustrated history, Batsford, second edition, 2001.