beancounter parodies

In other news, icebergs have been sighted

Selected posts from the current-events blog Talking Points Memo, if it had been written aboard the RMS Titanic.

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April 10, 1912 05:10 PM GMT link print

 

THE FAMOUS JUST keep arriving. According to the ship’s purser and longtime TPM reader, John Jacob Astor has boarded the ship.

 

If I recall correctly, Astor is an old crony of author Jacque Futrelle, who is also aboard. And both are staying on the same deck of this boat. Can anyone verify this?

 

April 10, 1912 – 08:42 PM GMT link print

 

A TPM  READER CONFIRMS that Astor is aboard. Further, Astor and Futrelle were sighted having coffee and scones with none other than J. Bruce Ismay, a representative of the White Star Lines, and three other men from First Class. Curiouser and curiouser.

 

April 11, 1912 – 12:44 PM GMT  link print

 

On a personal note, it should be noted that for a brand-new ship, there are quite a lot of rats sharing our staterooms down here in steerage.

 

April 12, 1912 – 08:30 AM GMT link print

 

OVERHEARD BY an alert TPM reader: Futrelle was heard to remark that “God Himself could not sink the Titanic.”

 

April 12, 1912 – 02:00 PM GMT link print

 

And then there were five. TPM reader JT writes,

 

Futrelle and Astor are indeed on board, rubbing shoulders with none other than Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon, Lady Gordon, and William Thomas Stead.

 

Early intelligence suggests that the connection between White Star Line rep Ismay does not end there. Ol’ Bruce is no stranger to Captain Smith’s table and the so-called First Class Five.

 

April 13, 1912 – 01:15 AM GMT link print

 

LATE-BREAKING NEWS: The “God Himself” remark was originally a direct quote from none other than Bruce Ismay. An interesting connection, and one which points to at least one highly-classified meeting about the schematics of this ship, occurring in the privacy of First Class. One is loathe to utter the word "conspiracy" with regard to this elbow-rubbing and sharing of expansively optimistic rhetoric. Luckily, TPM Muckraker has uttered it for us, so we do not have to. Go and read.

 

In other news, icebergs have been sighted.

ClerkClerk

What if the screenplay of "Clerks" had been written by the editors of the e-zine BoingBoing?

[Dante and Randal are two underachieving clerks at the convenience store. Jay and Silent Bob, two drug dealers, stand around outside. The film is shot in edgy black and white (for its viciously satirical pomo retro styling). Dante and Randal lean on the counter and stare at their Foxfire-based wifi powerbooks instead of talking directly to each other.]

Dante: Wouldja look at this? Record labels are so afraid that their markets are about to disappear as their customers move from buying CDs to downloading pirated music, that they put enough pressure on Suprnova.org that it fucking had to cancel its bit torrent P2P network! [link]

Randal: Bunch of fucking savages in this town.

Customer: May I use your restroom?

Dante: Er … I should tell you, our boss is in the middle of modeling the men’s room after a working Victorian-era urinal in the Crich Tramway Village in Derbyshire, and it’s up for an award presented by His Royal Highness The Duke of Gloucester. [link]

Randal: And the lights don’t work.

Customer: I’ll be careful. Do you mind if I take a pr0n magazine, too? I need reading material.

Dante: Sure. We’re very, very open-minded about pr0n around here. We recommend some fabu material by Sui/cide Girls, and not just because they pay a lot of money to advertise here! [link][link][link] Warning: NSFW!

Woman customer: Excuse me. Did you notice the guy despondently smashing cartons of eggs at the back of your store?

Randal: Uh-oh. You mean the free-range eggs from an organic farm in Portland, Oregon, run entirely by Norwegian ex-hookers who also make external iPod battery packs out of empty Altoids boxes and nine-volt batteries? [link][link]

Dante: Dude! UPDATE! Those iPod cases are being decorated with beaded Krishna motifs by ex-Bollywood video artists who have HIV! [link]

Microeconomics term, or grunge rock song title?

1. Negative creep
2. Dead weight loss
3. New damage
4. Still remains
5. A.T.C.
6. Indifference
7. Free rider
8. Kinked demand
9. P.C.C.
10. Credible threat