Guess what, the planet doesn’t care. Hey, here ya go. Enjoy a Category 4 hurricane. Have fun, losers! Signed, your best friend, Earth.
Category Archives: Weather
what’s coronavirus?
early spring, and welcome
After a mild winter, spring’s coming way early. This is welcome, though not 100% proven this stupid coronavirus likely spreads less effectively in the higher temperatures just like the flu does. Let’s hope for a super warm spring.
more evidence of the future downfall of all humanity
This morning while driving I watched a teenager, probably about 13, get out of his mother’s car to board his school bus. For you see, he was waiting in the warm car until the bus got there, instead of just standing at the curb. It was 43 degrees out. My younger brothers and I were walking to the bus stop, alone, in subzero weather before I was ten.
We’re all doomed.
the leaves have begun their mystical journey
I’m taking care of me Ma’s dog and I forgot how frantic and disorganized a multi-dog walk can be. She wants to go one way, he another, and before I know it my plastic poo bags are out of my pocket and halfway across the courtyard.
I got them back later but in the meantime (of course) one of them was ready to go. Seeing as how I was right near a trash can I tried to use a large fallen leaf as a plastic bag substitute. Don’t ever try this.
Anyways, the leaves have begun their mystical journey. All the colors, all the fun of Fall, which is by far my favorite season for a variety of reasons. Soon, nothing but bare branches.
Need to get out of this cubicle and on a hike.
nuke everything
So a twelve year old has recently suggested we nuke hurricanes. The news outlets of course went to reason and logic to countermand something that’s probably just best ignored. But we at TAP contain within insanity that knows no bounds:
1) Even if nuking hurricanes doesn’t work, why not just do it anyways, just to give it a shot? It’s only ocean out there, most of the ocean’s biomass is near the shores anyways, so let’s give it ago. What could go wrong?
2) Even if nuking hurricanes doesn’t work, why not battle weather where we can? If a hurricane can take a nuke and keep going, I bet you a big tornado can’t. Lots of room on all those plains to take a nuke blast.
3) And take the burning Amazon, it’s perfectly reasonable to get mad and preachy at Brazil for doing what Western nations did for most of the 19th Century, but putting out fires is easy. You just nuke the forest to remove the trees which fuel the flames. The forest firefighter doctrinal term is a ‘controlled burn’, only this time with a nuclear weapon.
4) The positive effects of lethal radiation are underrated.
5) Nuke work. Come on, you know you want to.
6) Nuke the Moon. Don’t get mad at me, the Moon started it, it’s time we finish things for good.
7) I don’t get why the zombie apocalypse thing is a thing. In reality, the war would be over in eight seconds because we have nuclear weapons whereas the zombies can’t use tools our ancestors wielded 30K years ago.
8) It would probably greatly benefit humanity to gather all celebrities and politicians onto a big boat, tow it out to sea, and then nuke it. Twice.
9) In all these stupid superhero movies, nuclear weapons give them super powers. I should go out into the desert with my own backpack nuke and give this a shot. What could go wrong?
10) I think if aliens are watching us they’d be baffled at how we’ve somehow managed to not use a nuke in nearly 75 years. Maybe we don’t all collectively suck as much as we think we do.
11) Did they ever nuke Godzilla? If so, did it work? I’m not 100% familiar with these films so I’m not sure. I’m sure they did, and that it didn’t work, which is dumb. After all, dude’s not immortal.
12) We have a garbage / plastic waste problem throughout the planet. Let’s just dig a huge ditch in the Australian outback and use that as the planet’s only landfill. And we just nuke it from time to time to clean it out.
13) Let’s face it, some countries probably should be completely annihilated with nuclear weapons. I’m looking at you Andorra, Isle of Man, Albania, Middle Earth, Belgium, Westeros, Bhutan, whatever.
14) And lastly don’t forget aliens. We’ll need to nuke aliens when they come for our beer supply. Granted, their ability to travel between planets likely means our nukes are completely ineffective and they’ll laugh at us from their bridge while they bat way our shitty technology, but it’d be a real cool blast for a few minutes. You know, before they began their assault. Bow and arrows, anybody?
What fun! Fireworks!
weather alerts are stupid
It’s going to thunderstorm tonight or this afternoon. As in, it’s summer (essentially). When I was growing up this was just a thing, like scenery. We lived in a neighborhood that overlooked an agricultural preserve on a lower hill. So we could watch the thunderstorms, thunder, and lightning for miles. It’s weather folks, it happens on most days.
That was then, but today it’s bubble wrapped humanity! And in a world where everything is a big deal, or controversial, or worthy of stupid hype, now your local cell phone provider spams your phone with weather alerts. To include the alert warning squeals you normally only used to hear during a tornado warning. Just for a stupid thunderstorm.
What kind of weak stupidity is this? Here’s your forecast folks, go look up at the sky. Or go outside and feel the temperature. We don’t need our hands held to the point a cell phone company has to tell you a storm’s a coming. How stupid do they thing we are? (very, very dumb => internet search American cell phone competitive comparisons with whole planet)
Cell phone alerts are strictly limited and appropriate for the following scenarios ONLY:
– Tornado
– Nuclear attack
– Blimp attack
– Bear attack
– You’ve been rendered redundant by your honorable employer
– Your fridge has no beer in it
– Elves
– Hurricane
– Supernova
– Alien attack
– Coked out celebrity is bashing your car and/or mailbox with a baseball bat
– Your childhood crush of a celebrity is at your door with a bottle of alcohol and/or a kitty or puppy
– Whiteout level blizzard
– Imminent asteroid strike
– You won the lotto
– You won the presidency of a small Eastern European mafia-like nation state
– Flash flood
– Avalanche
– A lawyer is spotted in your building
– Forest fire
– Nuclear meltdown
– Somebody, somewhere is using a plastic straw
– Your pet is currently robbing a bank teller at gunpoint
– Tsunami
That is all. Please carry on.
OH DEAR GOD!!! Nobody has ever seen this before. In all of Human History! Sound the alarm! Man the barricades. Panic!
will you survive?
Judging by the media coverage of this global storm colossus, there’s never been a major snowstorm in human history. They even named the storm “Jonas” for some silly reason.
So now we’re naming snowstorms like hurricanes? Soon the clickbait mafia is going to start naming light drizzle or a clear day. “This beautiful warm spring day Lucius is brought to you by Sprint. Sprint, connecting you to the better days of your life.” [cricket, cricket, cricket]
Will you survive? Yes.
But will the media tell you you’re going to die? Probably.
And yet, because life is complicated, we at TAP are going to help you with all of life’s problems. It’s what we do. Please don’t object. As always, your cooperation is truly, truly appreciated.
– You might never normally buy bread. But you’ll need bread. Lots of it. Go to your local shopette and buy 17 loaves of bread. If others object that you’re hogging all this rare bread, just tell him you’re buying it for starving kidnapped orphans. Then, whence in the parking lot, hock all your newfangled bread from the back of your car like it’s coke.
– When shoveling snow, wait until the last possible moment, when the storm’s almost finished and the snow’s at its heaviest and most difficult. Don’t hydrate at all, don’t wear gloves, and don’t take breaks. If you start to shovel, but then you take a break, that just means you’re a weak quitter. And you’re not a weak quitter, are you?
– If you happen to lose power, that means it’s time to immediately panic. Begin to break down your wood furniture with some tools. Make a pile of said broken wood, discarded trash, and old tax paperwork in your living room. Burn this while keeping the windows closed so you can stay warm. If you start to get sleepy from the CO, don’t worry, that just means your expert hasty fire is warming you effectively.
– If you happen to own a 1987 Honda Civic, you’re required to drive on the road as soon as humanly possible. Make your best attempt to drive at normal rapid speeds, using no extra caution whatsoever. Remember, if you’re driving slow over icy roads, that just means you’re a poor driver. And you still need to get to where you’re going, fast. You’ve got important places to be, after all.
– If you happen to own a 2014 Jeep Cherokee that you’ve equipped with snow chains, make sure to drive as slow as possible, as if you’re on your own personal Antarctic expedition bound for the Ice Age. If you exceed 10 mph, all you’re doing is increasing the wear and tear on your new snow chains, or scratching the sweet ass paint job on your immaculate SUV.
– If you happen to remain trapped indoors with your family, pets, house ghosts, friends, or enemies, just make sure to say nothing of value to them at all. Carry on throughout the weekend staring at your little small screens, and make no attempt to interact abnormally. Remain calm, the storm will be over soon, and you can go back to staring at little small screens during your normal routine. In the event of a power loss, have many batteries ready so your small screen can remain alight. If you run out of fresh batteries, lock yourself in a closet with your screen, and daydream that there’s something on there.
– Buy a shotgun and several shells. Annotate in your own blood the words, “Die Blizzard, Die” on each shell. Tonight, well in advance of the storm, walk into the local park and fire off a spread of shells into the sky screaming at the top of your lungs like a fringe barbarian. Expect this action to scare off the worst of the storm in some type of mystic druid ritual. It cannot fail.
BRING IT ON!!!
Happy New Year
Today the sun came out for the second day in a row, which is pretty cool considering it spent the previous 11 days hiding behind thick clouds and rain. The temperature also dropped about 30 degrees, so for the first time this winter it actually feels like winter.
Does this mean we’ll soon see this again out back for my youngest to frolic around in?
Perhaps. Who knows what 2016 will hold for us.
But I know one thing is solved already, giant squids! Did you know they saw one just rolling around Japan three days ago?
And in today’s ultra-second-reaction-zone you’re like, oh, that’s neat. And you unthinkingly move on to the next article. But then you’re like, wait, what? Giant squid!
Yep.
Except nobody seems to care, eh, where was the clickbait mania over this dude. He’s so awesome.
Hey remember all the days where every 8 months you’d see a new search for the giant squid adventure documentary on National Geographic or Discovery? Finding the giant squid was the nature equivalent of discovering Sasquatch, at least before he sold out to a meat processing ad company.
Seriously, here’s a documentary from 1994 entitled Sea Monsters: Search for the Giant Squid.
Now nobody cares. Well I care! We love you giant squid. Happy New Year giant dude. What does 2016 hold for you? What does 2016 hold for any of us?
Will Santa put a giant sloth under my bed, just to open the year for wackiness? Who knows? But I’m anxious to find out what this year holds for us all. Let’s go, friends!
“I have been provided with a prepositioned list of all your naughtiness.”
“Oh. Uh, …, want to pound some beers creepy giant sloth?”
…
“Yes.”
when you really think about it, this Santa concept is rather creepy
My mental priorities are usually out of alignment. I sometimes can’t even check off simple daily tasks that require coherent thought to avoid problems. For instance, I had to walk to the mailbox from work today and was rather shocked to discover it was pouring rain. And I was like, “Oh, I didn’t know it was supposed to rain today.”
I had no idea. Do most other normal people check the weather? I think so, so what’s wrong with me? It might be that since my first and last acts of any day involve me standing in the backyard with my dogs, that I use that as my daily weather checks. And since no rain or clouds this morning, I didn’t expect rain all day. Luckily for me, I carry a little umbrella in my bag at all times. So in theory, I’ve already accounted for my inability to conduct reasonable routine daily thoughts.
But while I’m not bothering my brain about little things like the traffic report, or whether I needed gloves today, I had this weird thought in my brain about whether I’d tell my kids that Santa is real. This is absurd lunacy as among other things I have no date or kids or immediate prospects of such things. Soon, I guess. But right now it’s just a weird pointless thought. But then my next needless thought was, why? Why?
Because when you really think about it, this Santa thing is kind of creepy. Take heed of these basic facts about this dude:
– Regularly practices the art of belligerent unsolicited home invasion
– Can apparently fold space and time but doesn’t go back in time to murder Hitler
– Implements child labor procedures that the Burmese authorities would find abhorrent
– Demands payment in food product that adds zero nutritional value to the human form
– Thus encourages lifestyle choices that would cripple the health care system with a pandemic of Type II diabetes
– Possesses emotional and technical monitoring powers that make the NSA and Jesus jealous
– Encourages materialistic domination of a possession based culture to the detriment of a value based society
– Rewards naughty or nice block designations off an arbitrary, unregulated, and unaudited obscure process
– Pontiff of a cult religion in which millions of his acolyte followers are commanded to dress just like him and convince children of the sanctity of his divine powers and demand that they pray to him to receive a beneficial response
Why is this still a thing? Why did humanity not banish the idea of Santa to the gutter alongside other winning ideas such as human sacrifice?
To get to the bottom of this most urgent of human dilemmas, we decided to call Jesus at his castle in Hawaii:
The Arcturus Project: Greetings, Sir.
Jesus Christ: How’s it going?
TAP: Happy early birthday then.
JC: It’s not my actual birthday, the 25th is a construct, it’s the message that counts.
TAP: So what’s your actual birthday?
JC: Uh, you’re a, you’re not listening.
TAP: New Years?
JC: …
TAP: So about Santa?
JC: Yeah okay, what about Santa then.
TAP: What’s the deal with this creep?
JC: He makes people happy, what’s wrong with you?
TAP: I have many problems, which one in particular are you referring to?
JC: Even the most child friendly, popular creatures in existence can be twisted in a dark way. But Santa’s a likeable, jolly guy, so people have decided he can stick around.
TAP: Lies. Not all popular child friendly creations are creepy.
JC: Oh yeah, take this Elmo guy. If you left his appearance, voice, and mannerisms exactly the same, but gave him a butcher knife in an NC-17 rated slasher horror movie he’d cause grown men to vomit in the theater aisles.
TAP: Not true.
JC: Oh yeah, feast on this image inside your brain, my Brother:
“Elmo has established a window into your soul!”
TAP: Jesus Christ!
JC: …
TAP: Oh, sorry. [shudders] I mean, I guess I see your point.
JC: Santa’s just about the dumbest creation in human history, except for yo-yos, but what he does is encourage family togetherness, the idea of somebody jolly watching over you, and the idea that you can happily pass traditions onto your kids like your own parents did; even if those traditions are somewhat foolish or creepy, like flying reindeer.
TAP: I guess I see your point.
JC: Nobody thinks about me during Christmas anymore. And I suppose eventually, if everybody told their kids Santa wasn’t real, that eventually he’d fade from Christmas too.
TAP: But he’s backed by Macy’s, so he’ll probably stick around. You’re only backed by all the powers of the universe, so eventually you might fade into benign oblivion.
JC: Good point.
TAP: What do we do?
JC: Tell your future kids Santa is real, have fun with it, like your parents did with you. And then tell them about the real point of Christmas too. Keep the traditions going that are worth preserving.
TAP: Got it.
JC: Cool.
TAP: …
JC: …
TAP: …
JC: Anything else?
TAP: So if the 25th isn’t your actual birthday, what do you normally do on that day?
JC: I usually go on a pre-New Year’s bender with my other religion bros. And we generally go see a movie, this year we’re of course seeing Star Wars.
TAP: Oh, that should be fun.
JC: Not according to your last post.
TAP: Uh, yeah, I guess. Sorry.
JC: It’s okay, but if the movie isn’t any good, I’m just going to blame you for ruining all of Christmas.
TAP: Isn’t that a little harsh?
JC: I have high standards that encourage positive thought and behavior.
TAP: How am I doing with that?
JC: Yeeaahh.
The Arcturus Project 