Leave it to the American court system to sound stuffy and humorless while at the same time produce comedy gold. According to my favorite cyber stopping ground, news of the odd, "A California state appeals court has ruled it is not libel to call someone a 'skank' or even a 'big skank' on the radio -- describing the word as 'a derogatory slang term of recent vintage that has no generally recognized meaning.'" Tell me this isn't incredibly funny. It's officially legal for me to call anyone I want a skank, because no one is really sure what a skank is.
"Dude, she is such a skank!"
"Huh? What do you mean by that?"
"You know, she's skanky. She exudes a particularly skanky quality that makes her truly a skank. She's the queen of skankdom."
"I don't get it."
"Dude, what's the matter with you? Are you some sort of skank or something?"
"I'm not sure"
But, the story gets even better. The suit was brought by a former contestant on "Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire," who was suing a San Francisco radio station program that called her names after she refused to appear on their show. Other names leveled against her included "local loser" and "chicken butt," both of which were also deemed by the court to be too vague to be considered libel.
"The appeals court rejected the plaintiff's claim that she was libeled, saying there was no way to prove that the disc jockeys had knowingly perpetrated a falsehood by describing her as a 'local loser,' a 'chicken butt' and a 'big skank.'" Hey, this stuff is just too rich to make up on my own. But, let's hear what the court itself had to say about the matter:
"The terms local loser and chicken butt are not actionable because they are too vague to be capable of being proven true or false," the court said.
Exactly what type of criteria would be used to verify whether someone was a chicken butt? This could be a rich field of scientific study, I'm sure of it.
"Well, the butt has a certain egg-shaped quality to it, but with an absence of feathers or a beak, I'm inclined to dismiss this posterior as a chicken butt."
Not much to report tonight, er, this morning. Whatever. Rodey the Rodent is rustling, which is just a super cool spring thing for a mouse to do. I did the hapkido thing tonight. The Korean masters are visiting, which means a language barrier, but they get their point across regardless. I'm about six months away from a black belt, but the anticipation is already killing me. I've been involved in martial arts in one form or another for the last ten years, a decade, so I'm ready to be awarded black belt status. The funny thing is, I started hapkido a year ago as a method of staying in shape, whereas my three years of Tae Kwon Do and Aikido were started because I wanted to be a black belt. When I started hapkido again (my first year was in Japan), I was more concerned about getting a massive workout rather than getting a black belt. However, my previous experience shot me through the ranks and now I find myself very close to a goal I thought was lost. If it happens, it happens. I'm still too docile to kick anyone's ass. Oh, what else can I do this morning? Let's try my hand at some off the cuff fiction. . .
Scott entered the Blockbuster video store and was immediately accosted by the seemingly bottled odor of fabricated Blockbuster structures (sort of a new car smell for movie rentals). Every building has its own smell. Hospitals smell like a crude mixture of despair, hope, death, life, sweat, medicine and catheters. Office buildings smell like paper, pseudo-efficiency (if that has a smell, but I believe it does), and microwaved popcorn. Blockbusters have a smell of dusty movies, carpet cleaner, and whatever sweaty employee may be standing next to you at any given time. Scott made his way among the domino display of movies and selected "Romancing the Stone." Of course he'd seen it before, many times before. But where else can you have romance, a treasure hunt, a crocodile eating a hand, and a happy ending? Scott smiled and made his way to the counter.
The girl behind the counter was attractive, in a shy sort of way. If you can define shy, I'd like to hear it. I define it as a furtive, nervous glance; an anxious soul that says nothing for fear of being exposed as overly interested, when, in fact, they're overly interested, hopeless romantics afraid to be exposed for what they are. Too bad, because they never let their true natures be known. And. . . Tune in forever for the next installment. It may happen, it may not.
Of Mice and Men (and boredom)
So, as I wrote my newspaper column last night, I became aware of a rustling in the leaves outside my window. I should note here that my room is in the basement, and my window descends about two and a half feet below ground, so there's a wooden boxed off area right outside my window. Apparently, a mouse has taken up abode there, whether by accidently falling in the window trap or intentionally, I do not know. So, anyway, I kept hearing a periodic rustling outside, so I went over to my window to investigate. No sooner had I stuck my face on the screen, when the mouse let out a startled "Peep!" and scurried under the leaves. This amused me to no end. So, every time I heard the mouse rustling away, I'd sneak up to the window and yell "Boo!" Each time, the mouse let out a startled peep and bolted beneath the leaves. Once, I think it was expecting me, because I yelled boo, and the mouse jumped up against the screen, startling the hell out of me. This is no minor league mouse. It is as big as a baseball and it has dark fur. I think I'll call him "Rodey the Rodent." Or maybe "Rodey the Rustling Rodent." Whatever the case, I'm debating whether to keep my captive window pet or fish him out and set him free. Oh, decisions decisions.
I'm back from Nashville, and, judging by my blog counter, I've have not been horribly missed. Ah, tis tough climbing the cruel ladder of fame and fortune. A few notes about Nashville. Nashville is hot. Nashville is humid. I'm in pretty good shape and I still broke a sweat simply by breathing. But, Nashville is decidedly more entertaining than Rochester (slogan: Welcome to Rochester, please don't wake the natives). I didn't intend to go into Rochester bashing, but since I'm here. . . I've lived in this city for three years, and I have yet to see anything here that makes me tilt my head back and say, "Wow! That's pretty cool." You see, Rochester has officially done away with anything even remotely cool. All the buildings in this town have been cut from the same boring block of granite. The mall? Boring. Nightlife? Non-existent, and spread far apart so you're likely to get pulled over while you're not having any fun. Downtown? Boring, unless you consider stop lights at every intersection somehow entertaining. Now, Nashville is entertaining. I'm not referring here to Opryland where I stayed for four days. Staying at Opryland is like living in a bio-dome while tripping on acid. Not that I've ever tripped on acid, but I'm making a metaphor here. Tripping on acid? So, there I was, walking down the street, and I tripped on this big pile of acid. Damn near melted my shoes clean off. Anyway, where was I? Ah yes, Nashville. The mall outside of Opryland was just awesome, and the downtown area of the city was alive with great bars all complemented with live music. I wanted to take a four block area of Nashville back with me to Rochester and plop it four blocks from where I live. Well, now I'm back at work and I'm facing a pile of tasks that require completion. More later. Maybe.
Now, in a bid to boost my site traffic, I'm going to repeat the name Hanna Montana a few times. Hanna Montana. Hanna Montana. Hanna Montana. Hanna Montana. Hanna Montana. Hanna Montana. Oh, and Amanda Overmeyer. Amanda Overmeyer. Amanda Overmeyer. Evanna Lynch. Evanna Lynch. Evanna Lynch.
