Holidays
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[ Add A Comment ]Posted on December 31, 2011 by admin in Holidays
Saturday, December 31st, 2011Go ahead and get yourself in a tizzy about the Mayan calendar. Me, I’m more concerned about Chicken Shawarmageddon and the Aporkalypse.
 Shawarmageddon Is Near |
One strange side effect of growing up in the era of the DVD and Roland Emmerich films
Occupy Christmas – 15 Gift Ideas For The Young Occupier In Your Life
[ Add A Comment ]Posted on November 29, 2011 by admin in Holidays
Tuesday, November 29th, 2011Parents, face it. If you cut off your good-for-nothing radical kid this Christmas, you’re only punishing CAPITALISM ITSELF.
 How can Santa bring you presents, if you don’t know what you want? |
So, you did your best to raise your precious snowflakes to be eager little capitalists. You clothed and fed them for eighteen years, then you sent little Justin and Ashley off to the finest schools your burgeoning debt and education loans could buy. And how do they repay you? They major in political science or philosophy, start THINKING and stuff, and before you know it, they RUN OFF TO JOIN THE OCCUPATION. Well, don’t give up the fight. If you disown your precious snowflake NOW, you’re doing two things to help them win their silly war against the fear and consumption driven world we lovingly crafted for them. First, by cutting them off, you’re just encouraging them to embrace their anti-consumer follies even more, running the risk that they’ll discover that money isn’t everything. Yup. Crazy as it sounds, some people ENJOY a modest lifestyle, and this peasant-like “every day’s a gift” attitude can be contagious. Second, by not spending thousands of dollars on them this Christmas like you always do, the OCCUPATION HAS ALREADY WON. Your “punishment” only punishes CAPITALISM ITSELF. So as crazy as it seems, the best way to prevent your youngster from running off and becoming some kind of vagrant, park-dwelling commie is to HELP THEM DO IT. That’s why we’ve rounded up this list of Holiday Gift Ideas for Occupiers. Read the rest of this entry »
Happy Holi!
[ Add A Comment ]Posted on March 19, 2011 by admin in Holidays
Saturday, March 19th, 2011Why the popular Indian festival of Holi hasn’t been cashed in on by American business is beyond me.
 Source |
What could be more fun than building bonfires while basking under the biggest full moon in decades, and the next day hittin’ the bhang, and splashing bright colors all over your friends in the sunshine? With American capitalism’s gift for commercializing just about any holiday – I mean, this is the country that turns Jesus into a fat guy in a red suit or a bunny, and Christian saints into babies with love darts or leprechauns swilling green beer – I’m AMAZED that no-one has brought the Indian festival of Holi into the mix. I must confess to my own utter ignorance until just yesterday; for years I had seen images on the web of Indian people partying in the street, doused in vivid color, and had no idea what they were doing. Well, now I know that it’s Holi, a celebration at the first full moon of Spring that also commemorates the survival of Prince Prahlada who, in defiance of his father’s wishes, worshiped Lord Vishnu, for which his father sent him to burn in a bonfire on his sister Holika’s lap. Or something like that. You can learn more on Wikipedia or one of the many sites devoted to the festival of Holi. Me, I’m calling Crayola and the makers of Super Soakers
What The Hell IS Presidents Day, Anyway?
[ Add A Comment ]Posted on February 21, 2011 by admin in Holidays
Monday, February 21st, 2011There seems to be a lot of confusion around what Presidents Day is actually celebrating. We’re here with the facts, and links to OTHER facts, if you don’t like ours. And by the way, Sarah Palin would make one mother of a founding father, don’t you think?
 Sarah Palin would make one mother of a founding father, don’tcha think? |
It’s interesting that Presidents Day, in spite of indicating a plurality, only specifically acknowledges one president, i.e. George Washington. To add to the fun, please note that the Uniform Monday Holiday Act did not officially call Washington’s birthday “Presidents Day”, it just placed the official holiday between February 15 and 21, which means it never actually falls on his birthday! In spite of these easily researched facts, the holiday is often inaccurately described in the mainstream, multi-million dollar a year press as a combined celebration of Washington’s and Lincoln’s birthday, as in this AOL piece. But that’s okay. As George himself said: “If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter”. And in this case AOL is only leading us dumb and silent to ignorance, not slaughter or anything. And ignorance is pretty hip these days. Especially when it comes to George Washington and the other founding fathers, who have sort of become the idealized heroes of the teabaggers and Sarah Palin. A phenomena that this USFCA piece observes is probably because they imagine that the founding fathers were “a composite of Atticus Finch, John the Baptist, and Ronald Reagan”. Let’s be clear though, Sarah isn’t partial to George or anything; much like newspapers and magazines, when it comes to founding fathers, she likes “all of ‘em”. Bill Maher gets a little harsher on this topic in the clip below. Enjoy, and Happy Presidents Day! Read the rest of this entry »
More Last Minute Valentine’s Day Gift Ideas
[ Add A Comment ]Posted on February 14, 2011 by admin in Holidays
Monday, February 14th, 2011Don’t be stupid. Be cupid. We have lots of Valentine’s day gift ideas, but if you only give one gift today, give some love. Damn. I wish Facebook had a LOVE button.
  Careful, that Love Gun is loaded, ’cause even Outkast knows that Every Day Is Valentine’s Day |
Happy Valentine’s day everybody. Especially you angry guys that were spreading your anti-romance propaganda all over the comments on our recent piece Last Minute Valentine Gifts For Romance Impaired Misogynists. You probably need some lovin’ more than anybody. Some people feel that Valentine’s Day has become a hollow Hallmark holiday, commercialized into meaninglessness just like Christmas. Which is partly true; I mean, why else would we spend so much time putting together clever but opportunistic Amazon product linkfests like our suggestions for personalized Valentine’s gifts (because you know, nothing says “personalized” like setting up a slave labor manufacturing facility in China and mass producing cheap gifts with customized messages on them). Or Valentines Day & Love Is Like Christmas At The Mall & Jesus . Or Valentine’s Day 2009: Is That Love Gun Loaded? Because nothing says “I Love You” like a $40,000 watch. Or any of our other offbeat Valentine gift ideas . If you really loved us, you’d buy something through those darn product links. Because nothing says “I love you” like a monthly commission check, right? But this crass commercialization of Valentine’s day is only a small part of the fun. If you’ve got your undies in a bunch about the whole thing, you’re doing it wrong. Or wait. I guess that depends on where your undies are in a bunch, and how they got there. The thing is, any holiday can suck, if you try hard enough. You can let external forces make you miserable, pondering things like whether or not edible panties are too intimate a gift for a third date, or whether you got the great table at the right restaurant, or – like those angry men we referenced earlier – sitting around bitching about why SHE isn’t doing all the spending. As we pointed out last year in Love Me, Love My Dog, men outspend women almost two to one. But if you do these things, you’re missing the point, and missing the fun. If you strip Valentine’s Day down to its essential meaning, it’s about expressing LOVE. And there’s nothin’ wrong with love. So do yourself and everybody else a favor. Chill out, and spread a little. If you spent ten bucks on those cheap grade-school Valentine cards for everybody at the office instead of grudgingly buying someone a bunch of roses or a pricey dinner, you’d be surprised at how many more smiles you see today, and how much better you feel. Personally, I think Outkast has it right with the idea that EVERY day is Valentine’s Day, which is why I think I think I’ll give Happy Valentine’s Day