Good riddance, 2006

Let's hope 2007 ends with better news than this one did.

In Maison du Machine, 2007 will be a year of good, positive upheaval.

I'll keep you posted.

Guess what I'm doing tonight...

Dear CNN:
Stop referring to Gerald Ford as "simple."
It's a condescending term that is usually used to wax nostalgic about Midwesterners.

You want "simple" folk?

Come to Minnesota.

Sincerely,

Frankie Machine.


p.s. How many war criminals could YOU count in the funeral coverage?

God Save The Queen

Stow it, Limey!
The Queen has called for more understanding between young and old people in her Christmas message.
In the speech, she said elderly people needed to be shown respect, while young people needed to be looked after and offered good advice and guidance.

Of course she'd say that. She's OLD!

And if you visit the comment board on that story here, you'll see the supposedly cultured Brits are just as incoherent as anyone else. My favorite missive from across the pond:
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh. How can u say that. The queen is the head of state and if u r complaing that she doesnt do anything you would be the first to complain if she decided to use her power.
The Queen is a vital part of our country abd why it has been prosperus.
Have you noy noticed that since parliament reduced the monarchs power the country has become less happy and more sad. The Queen costs 57p per person now u cant complain for that.
What would you prefer president Tonly Blair.
May the monarchy live on and prosper for ever and restore their rightful power aafterall they were chosen by god.

God save the Queen.
Maybe it sounds better after a pint of Boddys.

Gerald Ford

I have a favor to ask.
If any readers are in DC or Grand Rapids, please pay my respects for me by going to the viewing and whispering "Frankie Machine says Hi." He'll know.

Whatever you think of how he did as a President, you have to admire the fact that he refused to let his museum be named after a DeVos or VanAndel.

Back to work tomorrow

The elderly steal children's presents.
An elderly woman may face charges after she reportedly refused to return a child's ball that was given as a Christmas gift but then kicked into her yard by a child.

Holy Crap!
I did not know Marilu Henner went to the University of Chicago.
"My roommate Linda was dating him (Brown), and he would walk me back to the dorm from physics class to see her," said Henner, who later became an actress on the TV series Taxi and in Broadway shows.

Weird, huh? I bet the U of C experience was the best preparation for dealing with Tony Clifton.

Happy Holidays

Mr. and Mrs. Machine are going to enjoy a traditional holiday of Chinese food and movies.

Sit tight, and don't let the old people ruin your Christmas Spirit.

I'll be back in 2007, and will make it "The Year Of Vengeance." Elderly, you have been warned.

A little late...

But I must concede a point:
Minneapolis-St.Paul sending Keith Ellison to be the first Muslim Congressman is a good thing, and is pretty cool and emblematic of what America should be.

Therefore, I, Frankie Machine, make the following retraction:
The 136,061 people who voted for Keith Ellison are neither pigf**kers nor meth addicts.



I'd like it known, though, that Keith Ellison moved here from Michigan.

Classic

There are so many reasons I cherish this skit:
1. Dennis Miller is involved in something that is actually funny.
2. Phil Hartman, Rest His Soul
3. An old person gets it.

An OLD fashioned Christmas story

This is the funniest story I've read this Christmas Season.
"You mean I’m going to have to spend a couple of hours with a bunch of old people who sit around sleeping with their mouths open?”
...
The old man began singing in a wobbly voice, the words of “Hark the herald angels sing”. Slowly, one by one, other feeble voices joined in. Even those who were slumped awkwardly in their wheelchairs mouthed the words. Only Aunt Sue stood up and sang very loudly.

I didn’t realise how many stanzas there were in that hymn. Some of these people couldn’t remember the names of their own children, but they knew every word of the song. For awhile, I forgot about Penny’s party. It was weird

Maybe it's just memories of being taken out of school to sing at old folks' homes
(instead of actually learning)
but this story made my belly hurt.
From laughter.

More Elderly Menace

When are we going to start doing mandatory license-yanking?
Two Pleasanton teenagers stayed overnight in the hospital after being struck Tuesday evening by a car driven by an 85-year-old, according to a statement released today by Pleasanton police.

Apropos of nothing

Just thought it was funny.

Sorry for the disappearing act. Rest assured I'm not in some black-ops holding pen. Yet.
Really busy. Ask around. There's a shitstorm brewing.

Schadenfreude

B-licious, check the spelling on that one.


Funny Comic Strip Artist of the Day. Not "ha-ha funny." More like, "if you're gonna call Ted Kennedy a drunk, make sure you don't go driving drunk" funny.

Hoosier Edward Bruce Tinsley, creator of the conservative comic strip Mallard Fillmore, was arrested in Columbus Dec. 4 and charged with operating a vehicle under the influence -- his second alcohol-related arrest in less that four months, according to the Bartholomew County Sheriff's Department.


Tinsley, 48, who lives in Columbus, had a blood-alcohol level of 0.14 -- almost twice the level at which an Indiana driver is considered intoxicated. He posted $755 bond.

Republican hypocrisy at its lamest, folks.

Why I Needed To Leave

Bat
shit
crazy
letter to the editor.
Alcohol vote and Bible

Grandville voters' recent decision to allow alcohol sales on Sunday is disappointing, and it is sadly emblematic of West Michigan's gradual departure from biblical truth in general and Sabbath observance in particular ("Grandville approves Sunday alcohol sales," Press, Nov. 8). Sunday, the day that God has set aside for rest and worship, has become a day when hordes throng shopping centers and busy themselves with things that will mean nothing in eternity.

If we as a community looked to the Bible as our guide, we would heed the message of such passages as Exodus 20:11, Isaiah 56:2, and Matthew 24:20. While I am very thankful to live in an area where most people are religious, the Bible is very clear that religious devotion is offensive to God if it is not based on the truth. May our prayer be that our priorities would be more biblical and that we would return to our loving God who offers a beautiful promise in Isaiah 58:13-14.

DANIEL McCARTER
Jenison

"Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to prosper."
Benjamin Franklin


On the left is Daniel McCarter. On the right is someone with whom Frankie Machine went to high school.

Someone Else's Song

I'm sure I'm not the first to have this idea, but I think whoever owns the publishing rights to Orwell's 1984 (*) should release it with the title "2007," and edit it in such a way that every use of "1984" is replaced with "2007."
Change some names around (e.g., Iraq for Eastasia) and generate some buzz. Call it "The Memory Hole Edition."

I'd buy it. And I have a crap job in a craphole city.

1984 has always been called 2007.


* It's Sunday Morning and I'm too damn lazy to look this up myself.

Elderly Crime News

One finds justice.
An elderly Revere man who sued two state cops for false arrest after he pinned an off-duty Revere cop under his Ford Explorer lost his lawsuit yesterday.

One tries to find love.
A 70-year-old woman who called on the house of a 79-year-old man on numerous occasions without notice has been arrested under the anti-stalking law, police said.

Sounds like a threat to me.

The Comics Page is listening to me!

The Comics Curmudgeon reads Mary Worth like it's Maxim.

This is an accurate dramatization of this blog. I, Frankie Machine, am portrayed by Snidely Whiplash there, and the Elderly Menace is portrayed by, well, an Elderly Menace.

Toooooo perfect.

Lies!

I hereby officially declare that CNN stands for "Can'o'Nuts News."

MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota (AP) -- Heading home for the holidays, I'm already smiling as the plane approaches the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. The surrounding farm country is blinding in its unbroken whiteness through the flat horizon.

Unbroken whiteness and flat horizons? It's Siberia, and you know it.

Such are the memories of Christmases past for those of us who call the area home. One of my favorite wintertime moments was when two ice-fishers gave me barely liquid beer as the reward for having drilled my first hole through at least a foot of ice into black lake water. I drank the beer standing on Lake Harriet 50 yards from a popular beach, the downtown skyline reflecting the setting sun a few miles to the north.

Ecce drunko!
That's a play on the Latin phrase "Ecce homo!" for all you native Minnesotans.

Think Minnesotans exaggerate their Nordic prowess? The parade, in its 15th season, is only canceled for blizzards or at least minus 20 wind chill, that deadly combination of actual temperature and the speed of winds blowing in from the Canadian and Dakota plains. And of course, weather varies from year to year; the mean temperature on Christmas Day for the past five years has ranged from 34 to minus 4.

I can tell you firsthand that everyone here hates the snow and cold. Hates it so much they end up shooting each other out of frustration (higher murder rate than NYC!) and buying up Sudafed to cook up Meth.

You know what I had to do today at my job? I listened to two of my coworkers use racial epithets and laugh. No joke. People here are racist, ignorant, and deranged.

Another *^%&**^@!! workweek

Unfunny Comic Strip of the Day.
Don't bother looking. It's Crankshaft. In today's Crankshaft, the old codger is moving some sacks of birdseed, which I think are really sacks of meth.

Naive University of Chicago Students of the Day
At the University of Chicago, hundreds of students have joined a protest movement in recent weeks, worried that the university is “selling its soul” to get a higher ranking from U.S. News & World Report.

I was thinking about that today, and thought about the Bible verse that goes
"What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? "

I was driving through craphole Minneapolis as I thought that, and had the Devil appeared next to me in my unpaid-for car, I would have had my pen out to sign my soul over. All ol' Scratch would have had to do is give me a job that does not suck donkey.

I am not making sense tonight, so shut up!

Gramps, if she's as old as you, she's not worth killin' for.
Philadelphia police say an argument between two elderly men over a woman led to a deadly shooting this weekend.

To My Friend, the Czar

A couple of items of interest

First, Another drug dealing old person.
A grandmother found with a trunk full of marijuana was convicted of drug running in what prosecutors said was an attempt to earn cash for a bingo habit.

Second, my old enemy Gabe Suissa is back. He's now affiliated with Cross Country Moving & Storage of Kensington, Maryland.
So, beware.

Finally, Jesus' General catches on to the elderly menace.