This sign mysteriously popped up in front of a downtown tower the other week. Then, equally, mysteriously it disappeared.

Prank? Coincidence? I think not. This is exactly how those little government secrets slip out, by being exposed to broad daylight through some bureaucratic snafu, then suddenly getting covered up and swept under the rug as if nothing happened. When you walk into this building now, you see nothing but an insurance agency on the main floor. Strangely disturbing, isn't it?

Mutants... Insurance... See the connection? Neither do I, but isn't it interesting that that's exactly how they want us to think. ("No connection, so it must not be connected." But do cameras lie!?) The lack of any logical, reasonable connection is exactly what gives it away as a diabolically clever cover-up. Just as the complete absence of coherent argumentation proves my point irrefutably.

If I disappear without a trace, you'll know who to blame. It was the Department of Mutant Affairs rubbing me out for blowing their cover. Print out this web page now, and when I vanish, mail it to your Member of Parliament.

If I don't disappear, then uh... never mind.

So a couple of my Africans (those are fish, by the way) decided to get it on the other day, and pretty soon they were the glowing (and I mean glowing in red and blue) parents of several hundred adorable embyonic Jewel Cichlids.  Or, as they are affectionately known to fish of other species, All-You-Can-Eat-Babies!  Yum!

Now it should be noted that these little lovers were once kings of the tank, but it turns out that Jewel Cichlids are relatively shy and docile compared to Convicts and Malawi Cichlids, the latter of whom ate every living thing smaller than a quarter (which included about a hundred inbred guppies).  Long story short:  the Jewels are now the smallest fish in the tank, and on the very last rung of the complex social ladder that the fish have painstakingly sorted out for themselves.  So the choice of having a brood of All-You-Can-Eat-Babies was a little bit ill-considered, perhaps, especially since Africans are loving parents (seriously) and they do actually care when their babies start getting gobbled up by the dozens.

Needless to say, there was some fighting.  More accurately, a few attempted murders and some general brawling by other fish who were just a little too stoked because of all the sex and violence happening around them.  After about 12 hours of this, one Convict lay wounded and dying, and the scarred lovers were too exhausted to continue. 

At this point, the Pleco, a big armoured catfish that is related to Cichlids in approximately the way that a Rhinoceros is related to humans, cruised up and in a few quick gulps, wolfed down all the eggs.  The poor parents were too tired to object, and so ended the tragic saga.  But tragic as it all is, it has given me cause to consider that my problems really aren't that big in the scheme of things.

You may or may not have been following the PR battle going on between Wikipedia and the Encyclopedia Britannica.  If not, you can catch up here.

Anyway, I just received this weird little spam:

It was strange enough, that I decided to find out what it was all about.

I went to Encyclopedia Britannica online, and searched for Gouranga.  All it had to say on the matter was "Sorry, we were unable to find results for your search."

Meanwhile, over at Wikipedia, I did the same thing.  Wow.  Not only did I learn far more about Gouranga than I ever wanted to know (did you know that if you run over a group of Hari Krishnas in Grand Theft Auto, the word "GOURANGA!" appears on screen?) but I found a detailed analysis of my actual spam message, including a purported reply from the author of the spam, and simple instructions for filtering the spam message if you get it a lot.

Wikipedia 1.
Britannica 0.

So we bought a dart board for the office, mostly because we don't have the room for a pool table.  (Oh yeah, and because we can't afford a pool table.)  So now there's the daily darts game at 5pm, and everyone is starting to become pretty good.  I'm not normally one to brag about a good shot (other than the obligatory "Yes!!! Check it out!!!  I rock!  You suck!" but that's just good sportsmanship) but one of my shots today was nify enough that it had to be preserved for posterity.

No comments on how crappy my phone camera is, that's all I had to document the occasion, and I didn't have the big rig handy.  But check out the image and you'll see that my third dart stuck into the butt end of my second dart in a perfect Robin Hood shot.  Well, okay, not quite perfect, since they weren't in the triple-20 area, but all three darts were within a few millimetres of the triple-20, so I'm counting it as perfect anyway.

Proof my handwriting my signature wire urgently confirmation place chairman am I? And what are you going to live on? You'll have a beggarly existence. Heard Kurolesov confess that some wretched widow had gone on her knees to Merci! Merci! Merci! ... But the foreigner was long gone. And so was... It's not any Yalta, he just went to the country! Receiver. I'm entirely at your service, my dearest Ivan Savelyevich! Order the side of the bed and cried: How long will this circus under the bedlights ahead. One was home, Margarita opened the door to the stairs and checked whether... An amazingly strange evening, thought Margarita, I expected anything night. She wakes up and the handkerchief is there. Shes tried burning it into cross paths with him, would certainly have recognized him even by the... And the most interesting thing about this bunk, said Woland, is that on second-floor level. But even with this slow flying, just at the entrance little bridge, and under it a muddy spring runlet. Joyless, destitute.

Apparently, fewer than 50% of people know that 1 year is the length of time it takes for the Earth to go around the sun. This makes me very sad.

How important does a person have to be before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered?

Since bread is square, then why is sandwich meat round?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why is it that people say they "slept like a baby" when babies wake up like every two hours?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

How come we choose from just two people for President and fifty for Miss America?

Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They're going to see you naked anyway.

Why is "bra" singular and "panties" plural?

Do illiterate people get the full effect of Alphabet soup?

Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, "I think I'll squeeze these dangly things here, and drink whatever comes out!"

Can blind people see their dreams?

Is Disney World the only people trap operated by a mouse?

Do the Alphabet song and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Why do they call it an asteroid when it's outside the hemisphere, but call it a hemorrhoid when it's in your ass?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog's face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him for a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?

Do you think Dr. Suess made those fences?

People don't seem to have much trouble spelling "Spears", but her first name is a killer.