Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.I particularly like rules 2 and 5.
Never use a long word where a short one will do.
If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
Never use the passive where you can use the active.
Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.
Okay, like "utilize"--can English just lose that word? Three syllables to say "use"--WTF. People only say "utilize" instead of "use" because they think it makes them sound smart; in fact it makes them sound like half-wits who don't know language.
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In Azumanga Daioh the girls take a summer trip to Chiyo-chan's beach house, and Tomo-chan wants to smash a watermelon. They forgot to bring a bat or other blunt instrument, and Tomo-chan is reduced to karate-chopping at the watermelon.
Here is an alternate method:
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WEERD has a story about the efficacy of gun control in England...but in fact it's also a story about the efficacy of socialized medicine.
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I had just been wondering the other day about our "limited kinetic action" in Libya and where it fell under the War Powers Act.
Turns out it's been almost 90 days, and Obama's been totally ignoring the law. How interesting.
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If Wisconsin is the 49th, it means Illinois is the only state in the union which forbids self-defense. *sigh*
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The difference here is that the predictions of an ice age that we're back to--this time--are based on solar output, not on human activity.
Still:
news sites that previously bought into the AGW/CC myth were quick to attempt to minimize the announcement. "However, the temperature change associated with any reduction in sunspot activity would likely be minimal and not enough to offset the impact of greenhouse gases on global warming, according to scientists."Of course not. And so I haul out the graph yet again:
Earth is cooling, and it's cooling despite a continued increase in CO2. Suck it, bitches.
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Midwest Chick embeds a YouTube video of perhaps the most awesome bit of dialogue from Babylon 5.
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...damn thunderstorms kept me awake until 6 AM. Every time I'd start to drift off, CRACK! and I'd be wide awake again. *sigh*
Though the radar was all reds and yellows, there was almost no wind; it was just rain, thunder, and lighting, so I was able to leave my windows open. It remained nice and cool in here all day; as long as the current conditions hold I should be able to keep from using the air conditioning at least through Friday, when they've predicted temps in the low eighties. (And about ninety for Sunday. *sigh* Welcome to summer!)
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Thinking about the old stories reminded me of something one of my friends did that was f-ing hilarious, and I was thinking about telling the story here...but while remembering the story it made me think of how Jackie Gleason and Art Carney worked so well together. How Ed Norton would say something stupid, Ralph Kramden would yell, "GET OUT!"...and how similar that is to Japanese manzai comedy, and how truly universal human characteristics are.
Unfortunately, this highly intellectual thought drove the story I wanted to tell right the F out of my mind. *sigh* So the hilarious story will have to wait until I remember it.