Did anyone else have problems with Blogger last night? I don't know if there was unusually high solar activity, or a surge in the electric grid, or if Joe Biden had a coherent thought, but whatever it was, Blogger freaked out. And freaked me out in the process.
Let me explain.
While surfing the blogosphere last night, my laptop screen started flashing strangely. It made unusual beeping noises and vibrated so much, it nearly jumped off the table. I steadied the laptop, and as I was about to reboot the thing, it settled itself down, and the image stabilized. It had never acted that way before. As the thoughts "That was weird!", "What the heck just happened?" and "I hope my comment at CMR got saved!" simultaneously ran through my mind, the image on the screen came into focus. I couldn't believe my eyes. My own blog appeared, and I was looking at a post....from the future!! I read it with trepidation, each successive paragraph describing a horror that...that...well, you should read it for yourselves and come to your own conclusions. I managed to take a screenshot of it before it faded from view:
THURSDAY, JUNE 22, 2011
Today Just Sucked
Tonight's post exceeds my Local Content regulated limit for the week, but I don't care. Let the Youth Brigade blueshirts come and interrupt my wireless service again, the freakin' punks. I might take a couple out before they do. Today made me so damn angry, it doesn't matter what they do anymore.
This morning I had to renew my driver's license and registration - I was dreading it because this was the first time I've had to do that since all the new regulations were put into effect last year. So I got all my papers together, made sure I had enough money in the checking account to cover the vehicle registration ($732 for local fees, state fees, federal fees, UN Zone fees, climate impact fee, evaporated gasoline recovery fee, road rage education fee, multiple passenger fee[I have a minivan], 10K+ miles/year fee, English-only forms fee and natural born citizen fee), and went down to the neighborhood United Nations General Secretary of State office.
Five f****** hours later, I finally made it to the front of the line. I thought I was going to go crazy, listening to all the stinkin' propaganda coming from the televisions - Obama this and Obama that; "Yes we can" crap over and over, Chris Matthews plugging the latest bailout (another one for the newspapers!). Needless to say, I wasn't all that happy once I got to the counter.
So then the fat whale-in-a-standard-issue UN-blue muumuu bureautard looks over my papers, pulls up my file on the screen, looks at me with those beady eyes, behind her stupid square glasses beneath the stupid UN-blue tri-cornered cap and gives a little 'tsk tsk' and shake of her head. Uh oh.
"What?" I asked.
"Well, Citizen 135-222LD, it says here you're noncompliant in your Generations Invigorating Volunteerism hours. You're 32.5 hours short of the requirement."
Oh crap! My mind is racing. I paid Myron the $500 to get me the required 100 hours! The twerp cheated me! You just can't trust anyone on the Volunteer Hours black market anymore!
"Are...are you sure?" I asked.
"Mmm-hmmmm," she responded, in the smug way that only an overpaid, overweight bureautard can. "I'm sorry, but until you complete your Generation Invigorating Volunteerism hours, I cannot issue you a new license or register your vehicle. I'm going to have to impound your van until you're in compliance. And that will be $732."
"I lose my van, and I have to pay?"
"Think of it as co-latt-eral," she said. "Incentive."
I gave her the check. Fortunately it was from a bailed out banking institution, so it was good here. But this really sucked. "Come on," I implored. "Isn't there something you can do?" I gave her a look that suggested I was willing to do anything to get this taken care of. Well, not anything, mind you - I still have my dignity to consider.
"Excuse me, Citizen 135-222LD, are you attempting to bribe me?"
Man, this woman was an itchy trigger finger waiting for a target, and I just stepped into her crosshairs. "Just a little help, that's all," I answered, pushing my luck.
She looked at her screen again, fingers typing with all the speed of a half-asleep sloth. "Hmmmm," she said. "Hmmmm," again. Then she looked at me through those stupid square glasses, a condescending look she must have picked up from watching way to many presidential press conferences. "Says here," she said with a menacing tone that pinched my eardrums, "that you voted for McCain in '08. Sorry - I can't help you. Oh - and your Generation Invigorating Volunteerism hours are now up to 48.2."
"But - "
"NEXT!!"
By the time I got outside, the peacekeepers had already slapped wheel boots on my van, so I had to walk over four miles home. While on the way, I stopped at the Mega Starbucks - you know, the kind with the Free-Trade Target store inside? Our town just had one built a couple months ago, and I hadn't shopped there yet - for an iced Fair Trade coffee and Multi-grain GMO-certified Oatmeal Carob Cookie. I still had $40 on me, so I knew I was good for it.
I get to the counter and place my order, and when the teenaged girl told me the price ($37.50! Yes - I was golden!), I took out my wallet and handed her the two twenty's. She looked at them, looked at me, popped her bubblegum and said: "Sorry, like, we don't accept that currency here."
Say what? "Whaddya mean? This is US currency - Andrew Jackson, right there!"
"Who?" Smack smack with the gum - she was as stupid as she sounded. "Um, anyway. We, like, only accept Geithner bucks. You can go to the currency exchange in aisle 4 if you'd like."
Stupid Geithner bucks - the international currency. So I went to aisle 4 - past the Chinese condoms, the Plan B (in five exciting flavors!) cartons, the compact fluorescent bulbs - and exchanged my $40.
Wow - a whole $12.32. There goes my iced coffee and cookie. So I settled on a cup of water and a tofu 'Healthcube'. I wanted a Coke and bag of chips, but when the checkout lady scanned the items and my citizen ID number, my National Health & Human Services Patient Record came up on her terminal and "suggested" a more healthy alternative. Since I didn't have enough G-bucks to cover the Health Penalty, I had to get the water and crapcube. Not going back there again, that's for damn sure!
That was my day. Like I said, I'm sure the Youth Brigade will be here any minute to talk to me about my volunteer hours crap (Myron, if you're reading this, you are so toast!!) and "discuss" my blogpost limit violation. I wish the local Fairness Doctrine officials (yeah, I know they're not called that, but let's be honest, shall we? "Local Content and Minority Broadcasting Board" is just a smokescreen!) would do their own dirty work, the cowards. Sending punks to enforce their stupid rules.
Well, sorry for this rant. I'm just so fed up with our loss of freedoms and all these UN regula
POSTED BY LARRYD AT THURSDAY JUNE 22, 2011
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The post ended just like that. Scary weird.
Oh, and I read the comment. It was from Myron. He wrote: "I only take G-bucks now. Sorry dude."
Instant "Acts"ess
