FUF #8

If you looked up at the night sky and asked for UOPTA's Follow Up Friday to be humorous today, then you might say it was an "F-U wish upon a star." I'm hoping it'll come true (and you should use that horribly set-up and horribly executed pun as the benchmark). To those of you who observe such days, I hope this is a good Good Friday for you. If you don't observe it, then I hope it's just a good Friday. Playing with capitalization is fun! No, seriously, I find that fun. Without capitalization, I might accidentally eat a sausage with polish on it. See what I mean? Fun...and helpful too.

First off, Happy Birthday to one of my most frequent commenters, Sacky Christi. Have a good one, buddy, and try not to focus on thie Kings missing the playoffs this year, because no good will come of that.

Car Watch Time!
Loyal reader and official UOPTA "Former Roommate" Rockabye spent a lot of time in his car again this week, so it's no surprise that he found two very worthy things to pass along. First, the head-scratching bumper sticker: "Custer Died For Our Sins." I'm not too up on my history of Custer and Little Bighorn, admittedly, but I found that to be a very odd thing to slap on one's car. At first glance, I read it as "Custer's death was a direct result of the U.S.' ill treatment of Native Americans." But then I think of how dying "for our sins" was a "Good" thing when Jesus did it, and it confuses the message for me. Can anyone help clear this up? (Note: the capitalization worked beautifully there, didn't it?)

The other offering from Rockabye was a plate that read "PMSXPRS." Wow, I do not want to tailgate that car. Way to set the movement back a little, ma'am, because naturally every woman is a raging bitch for a little while each month. Oh sure, it could be "Pam's Express," but that would be a folly of grand proportions.

Speaking of which, when I was living in Santa Barbara, I was thinking about getting a personalized plate on one of the "ocean style" varieties with the whale tail on it. I wanted to find a way to make the pun "S.B.eautiful," but it was too hard with the limited space. I could've done "SBUTFUL," but it looks like "Es buttfull," so I abandoned the idea all together. If that lady's name is Pam, then someone really should've stopped her before she got that plate. (Even it her name's not Pam, stopping her might've been a good call.)

Driving on the 101 a few days ago, I was behind a plate that read "IM WILD." I didn't get close enough to see if there was also a bumper sticker that read, "I'm a rebel - please look at me and give me attention! I'm different, I swear!" As I passed her, I wanted to give her the universal mock-scared gesture of raising your hands to your cheeks, spreading your fingers and moving your wrists back and forth while saying "Oooh," but I needed to concentrate on driving with at least one hand. Stupid demands of driving.

My bro called me to say that he was behind a car with a sticker worth mentioning. I concur. There were crosshairs, like looking through a gun, and it said, "This is my peace sign." Wow. I think I may rather tailgate the PMSXPRS than that dude.

My mom called me (Friday's would be so empty without my immediate family) to say that she saw "My Kid Snowboards Better Than Your Honors Student" on a bumper sticker. Way to set the bar high. Apparently the "My Kid May Not Be Smart, But He Sure Makes a Mean PB&J" sticker was sold out.

Lastly for Car Watch, I saw a bumper sticker that said, "Harry Potter for President." Allow me to quote the constitution for a moment: "No person except a natural born citizen...shall be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty five years, and been fourteen Years a resident within the United States." (Article 2, Section 1). They left one thing out: you can't be fictional. Therefore, Mr. Potter fails on every account. I'll sometimes let the "fictional" clause slide, like in the "Bartlett for President" stickers, but I think you should need at least one of the criteria to make it to bumper sticker status.

On Monday, I wrote about my old elementary school principal named Mrs. Bailey. Both my brother and loyal reader Sue wrote in to remind me of the reunion my brother's class had. Mrs. Bailey was there, and two things worth mentioning came from that. First, Mrs. Bailey said something along the lines of, "I'm probably now the age that most of you thought I was 20 years ago," which is funny and most likely accurate. Second, Kevin told her about my mom's annual "Mrs. Bailey called" routine on April Fools' Day, and she was shocked that her legacy has been one of fear. I can imagine that was tough to hear, but as my elementary school principal, I was more afraid of her than Darth Vader.

Bratty Kid Sister (BKS) wrote something in the comment section that I'd like to expand on. As I've mentioned several times in this space, my poor wife hears all of my jokes and stories multiple times. When we first started living together, I would make a little joke every so often. If I didn't get any response from her, I'd repeat it, not knowing if she heard me the first time. Often, she did hear it but it didn't move her to laugh, hence the silence. She certainly didn't need to hear the non-funnies twice, so she changed her tactic. I'd say something, and she'd say, "Very funny." "Really?" I'd ask. "No, not really," she'd reply. That then morphed into what BKS referenced, which was the "I heard you, but it wasn't funny" response to cover all of the bases. She finds a lot of what I say to be humorous, but BKS loves that response so much that I thought I'd share it with the world. Or at least the 8-10 of you reading this.

Three last quick hits before I release you to the rest of Friday. At one point, Geico changed the person who does the voiceover of their gecko character from a British accent to an Austrailian accent. No mention of it, just changed one day. I just wanted to be clear that I noticed the difference, and I think they could've at least acknowledged it by introducing the original one's "cousin from Down Under" or something.

Next, I wrote a whole entry on funny spam email subjects I was receiving, and I got one that made me chuckle aloud. That's actually not that easy to do, so it made the cut: "Get a visit from the big dick fairy." I'm guessing they didn't intend for the double meaning there, but without the wonders of capitalization, one can never be too sure. (Man, I love it when a theme happens on its own.)

Lastly, I wrote the phrase "off the hook" yesterday, and it got a Barenaked Ladies song with that as the title in my head for the rest of the day (and today as well). They're really brilliant songwriters, and this particular one illustrates my case. It's sung to a woman who has an unfaithful husband. The first time around, it says, "He was only wanting you to let him off the hook." The second time it's brought up, it's "You will make him eat his words right off the hook." Then, at the end of the song, "From now on, the phone stays off the hook." Simply excellent songwriting there, and I wanted to share it with you, gentle readers.

(Current slang now uses "That was off the hook!" as "really good," but they didn't incorporate that. I've heard that phrase morph into "off the chain" and then (naturally) "off the chizain," so be on the lookout.)

Have a fantastic weekend, everyone. You deserve it. In fact, give yourselves a hand. See you back here - oh crap. Last thing - I almost forgot - the answer to the George Clooney edition of "Guess the Fakey" on Monday is...Journey to Hanali. None of the four guesses were right, which only means that Mr. Head-Wobble's been in some pretty weird flicks. See you Monday!