some people are not funny

i mean, i'm no class clown... but i've been known to crack wisely. anyway last week i heard someone use "no pun intended" during a speech in which he used no pun. in fact i remember exchanging confused glances with other members of the audience at the misstep. in retrospect, as a socially awkward situation it was pretty funny. but back to topic: i can fathom someone not understanding the concept of, say, irony... but the pun? isn't that comedy 101?

it made me think; the universe is quite often a balance of opposites. just as there are comic geniuses with excellent delivery there must be others out there with perfect anti-timing. imagine someone with the ability to drop a punchline at the worst possible time... a hear-a-pin-drop singularity, if you will... a comic failure so colossal that time would physically stop and jesus christ would return saying, "jesus fucking christ that was awful!" that would be hilarious.

marc was last seen trying to ascertain whether finding hilarity in someone's systematic lack of humor constitutes irony.

what's the powerpoint of it all?

at the start of the semester's first class in continuous time finance the electricity went out. neither the students nor the instructors were able to figure out how to get the lights back on. see, the room is so advanced the lights aren't controlled by switches. switches are for third world countries. here in the developed world we have to get an "engineer" to unlock a control room, and turn some knobs and get the lights on for us. then we spend another 15 minutes trying to get the computer, the projector and the screens to work. technology helps us learn.

joke

two blind guys walk into a bar. the first one says, "ouch! i didn't see that bar there." the other replies, "me neither."

headlines

area nerd feels slightly intellectually stimulated while jerking off over tina fey.

rudolph giuliani confesses to vandalism of hundreds of 711 signs before SC primary.

writer's strike remains unresolved. talk show hosts reportedly "not getting as much ass."

danny de vito given lifetime award "best celebrity pronunciation of the word 'whore'."

area nice guy's sensitivity "truly cherished" by cheating girlfriend.

gambly new year's

fun poker is awesome. if we were to play texas hold 'em continuously for hours, sure it would build our skill at one game, but the tedium would be undesirable. having the dealer call / create a game is so much better. here's a list of the staples and the more unconventional concoctions we've come up with, playing of course with a double deck:

texas hold 'em
omaha hold 'em
stiff pokey
acey doucey
kings and little ones
one eye jacks & kings with swords
69 / the cockblocker (my game)
pairs wild
LES (otto's game)
cricket
fiery cross
maximus wildus / last biggest (my game)

feature of the day: maximus wildus

each player gets three in the hole. there are four river cards laid out. betting takes place before and after each river card is flipped. the last biggest river card is wild. you make the best five out of your three and the four river cards on the table. it's trickier than it may first seem. lots of opportunity to try to run people with semi-bluffs midway through the game. luck can change fairly drastically from one river card to the next.