Deathcore Spongebob.

Ladies and Gentleman, I give you Spongebob Squarepants performing his version of Job for a Cowboys "Knee Deep" Enjoy your underwater rocking.

Stop Already...

Here is a recent pet peeve: The stupid hotness of pursing one's lips together to take a picture. Where did this orginate? I know that the vast majority of high school kids on myspace do this, and I know that New Jersey guido's do this, but why? When was the memo passed around in which making your face looks like a cow's ass became mandatory? Moreover, what is this supposed to represent?

There are several variations on this picture, the most common of which is the practice of holding your camera above your head and looking up into it while making the ass-face. Inexplicably, this picture is most commonly taken in front of the bathroom mirror. Again, I am not sure what the goal is, but there it is. Evidently, it has now become somewhat popular to integrate lollipops into the ass-face picture.

I know, I am getting old and crotchety, and this just seems like I am shaking my fist at pesky kids, but I just don't get it. Whatever.

Being funny is easy.

Believe it or not, I actually have to put a little thought into what I write on here. I genuinely want people to laugh and to visit TWWoT for a break, and so while most of my stuff is probably the antithesis of comedy, I am at least trying.

Occasionally, I don't have to do anything, as comedy presents itself pre-written. Sometimes life throws you a bone, which will sound very funny here in a second after I paste and bold in an actual headline that I found today:

Lynchings in Congo as penis theft panic hits capital

Honestly, what could I write to make that sentence any better? You have people getting strung up over penis theft, a crime that I was previously unaware of but am now terrified of. Of course, getting hung (ha, see that's unintentionally funny) is no laughing matter, but being hung for penis theft? Pretty funny.

Anyway, to prove I am not just fabricating lies, here is a link to the article, which is as funny as anything I could have dreamed of writing, particularly given it's seriousness, especially the last line...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080422/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_congo_democratic_witchcraft;_ylt=AlHUJQn7Qpaku_n0V6U1128DW7oF

Nature is a cruel mistress.

Really, what can I say about this picture? Deer + Lion = dead deer. It's somewhat more disconcerting to imagine the deer replaced by a hiker, and more disconcerting still to realize that people get nabbed by mountain lions on a fairly regular basis. As a gunny, I spend a lot of time thinking about how to neutralize threats of this nature via the awesome power of ballistics, and pictures like this make me realize that there are times that a gun can be both comforting and useless all at once.

Anyway, enjoy the pic and try not to get eaten.

Edit to add: By the way, this was taken by a remote camera that was set up to monitor this particular trail to see if deer even used it. That the lion was captured on camera was wholly unexpected. I got the impression that the hunter that set this camera up was unaware that there were even lions in the area.

Apocalypse more likely thanks to teenager.

I am sure that this isn't breaking news to anyone, but I read a story today in which a 13 year old teenager from Germany figured out that NASA is wrong, and NASA was forced to agree.

Basically, there is a big asteroid called Aphosis heading in our general direction and it is supposed to arrive in 2029. NASA said that it only had a 1 in 45,000 chance of hitting Earth. I, for one, like those odds. This kid redid the math and discovered that it's actually a 1 in 450 chance of smacking into us. Turns out, the kid was right. Still not horrible odds, but would you rather have a 1 in 45,000 chance of getting blasted in the eyeball with brass knuckles or a 1 in 450 chance? I thought so.

Does this freak anyone out other than me? It's not like I lie awake at nights pondering astro-physics, but the main reason for that is that I have put my faith in NASA to get it right. I know that humans make mistakes, and my faith is further encouraged knowing that the smart people at JPL, FermiLab and Stephen Hawking are all sitting around with nothing better to do than double check NASA's math and develop new theories on quantum physics. What I don't like is that some 13 year old kid basically just owned every astro-mathlete in the entire world. I am sure the kid is smart and all, but I simply don't like hearing news of an increased chance of an apocalypse coming from someone who probably can't talk to a girl without getting dizzy.

On the plus side, you know what this kids name is? Nico Marquardt. That at least explains his genius, even though my branch of the family dropped the "d". On the negative side, this was the result of a science fair project. A regional science fair. Not national, European, or international. Regional. We all did science fairs, and some of us even made it to regionals, generally on the basis of our awesome volcano's or our experiments with milk mold. This freaking kid did his regional science fair project on a killer asteroid, and in doing so possibly alerted mankind to it's extinction. Doesn't that sound completely out of place?

Let me quote directly from the AP article:

"Both NASA and Marquardt agree that if the asteroid does collide with earth, it will create a ball of iron and iridium 320 metres (1049 feet) wide and weighing 200 billion tonnes, which will crash into the Atlantic Ocean.

The shortwave's from that would create huge tsunami waves, destroying both coastlines and inland areas, whilst creating a thick cloud of dust that would darken the skies indefinitely."

It's great that NASA agrees with Nico. Perhaps they will purchase him a Wii as a reward for pointing out their blunder in incorrectly predicting the odds that a 200 billion ton iridium doom-ball might come visit us in just a few short years.

I would also like to point out that this entire post remained free of any Armageddon jokes, which I am sure you will see everywhere. We (meaning Me) here at TWWoT like to think we are better than that.

The Republic almost loses one...

This picture, taken in the Pacific system, shows a fighter flown by rebel Lt. Elmer "Jugs" Skywalker that was almost lost during the early days of the campaign against Darth Hirohito. The accident was officially blamed on a faulty STS Parabellum Multicopulator in the terrestrial navigation droid, but even now many of the surviving sailors on deck that day swear that they felt the power of the dark side.

Atwood Knife and Tool and DL Knives

So, even though I rarely mention it, part of the purpose of me blogging is to spread the word about cool stuff, particularly cool stuff that falls within the boundaries of my love of guns. Interestingly, knives very much fall into those boundaries. You would be hard pressed to meet a Gunny who didn't have an opinion on knives, and it is equally hard to find a gunny who doesn't own at least one good knife, be it a good old fashioned Case or an uber-tactical Strider. The point here is that I like (good) knives almost as much as I like guns.

Atwood Knife and Tool is a one-man operation out of Turners Falls, MA. The guy that owns it, Peter Atwood, hand-makes small knives and tools for a reasonable price. Basically, he builds his tools in small lots, and sells them over the Internet. He isn't so much a custom knife and tool maker as he is a boutique knife and tool maker. He has a fairly wide selection of designs that he builds, but as I mentioned, he only builds small lots of a particular item at any given time, so if your interested, you may have to wait for awhile until he cranks out a lot of what you want. He can and does literally everything, to include the heat treating, although he mentions on his website he sometimes sends his stuff out to be treated as a time saver.

He came to my attention because of a tool of his called the "Prybaby", which is essentially nothing more than a small pry bar (and less importantly, a bottle opener) that you can carry in your pocket or even around your neck with no particular effort. It strikes me as a fantastic idea, with a pretty fair amount of daily usage possibilities. Anyway, you can check out the picture at the top of the blog to see what it looks like. He also makes bike tools, gas tools, knives, and a host of other things. I have a link to his blog (which is where you would go to see what products he has coming up for sale) under my links section, and you can link to his website from there to check out his different designs.

I am obligated to mention that I personally have never used an Atwood tool, only having become aware of them a couple of days ago. Research indicates that he builds a high quality product that he stands behind, and I could find no reports of bad business practices or unhappy customers. I found several positive reports. Anyway, check out his stuff and enjoy.

Along those same lines, I want to mention DL Knives. The owner, Don, is a frequent poster on The High Road, and he makes some exceedingly attractive knives. Don is a custom maker, and as such his knives are somewhat pricier than many (but not all) off-the-shelf knives. In terms of a custom made knife, his prices are very, very reasonable. I am particularly fond of his "Small Skinner" design, and one day I will own one. Below the link is an example of this design (albeit a fancy Damascus example, which is not the norm). Anyway, check out his website here:

http://www.dlknives.com/

Again, I have never used or owned one of Don's knives, but I feel absolutely comfortable saying that they are an excellent product. Additionally, from having read the stuff that he posts, he seems like a pretty nice fellow. Also, an example of his "Super Camp" knife was recently featured in the May issue of "Blade" magazine, and the same knife will be featured in the April issue of "Tactical Knives".

So, there you have it. If your into this stuff, you will enjoy looking at the stuff that these two guys make. If you don't like it, you're dumb, and probably a bad person.

Machinegunnery and stick-fighting.

So, me and my shooting buddies went to a Machine-gun shoot today, which was fun. Lots of explosions, lots of machine-gunnery, some WWII reenactors and a couple of bowling ball mortars. Fun.

I rode to the even with my unnamed shooting buddy (USB) and his wife, which proved to be extremely entertaining for all. My USB's wife said several very funny things throughout the course of the day, which I will now relay. If you don't find them funny, too bad.

1. Evidently, USB once spanked his wife on the bottom because she randomly cracked him across the back of his legs with a stick while they were walking the dog.

2. Evidently, USB and his wife have a long standing argument about whether or not cows have knees. It turns out they do.

3. USB's wife calls all soda "coke". In doing so, AT pointed at his Pepsi and slowly said "peeeeepppppssssiiiii". The following conversation ensued.

USBW Where I'm from we call everything Coke, even lemonade.
Me: Really? So you take a shower in hot Coke? Do you go swimming in Lake McCokeahay?
USBW: No, not like that. We call only fluids coke.
Me: Water is a fluid.
USBW: No, only fluids you drink.
Me: You can drink water.

I also got to see one of the most anticipated new guns of the year in prototype form today, the Magpul Masada. Bushmaster is going to be manufacturing them under the name "ACR", but Magpul designed it, and they had a working prototype. It was cool, but I think it is going to be a little to expensive for me.

In general, it was a fun Saturday.

NKOB Reunites: Global manliness drops 37%.

Much to the delight of a certain girl I know, NKOB are reuniting. Cripes.

Donny Wahlberg, what are you thinking? Your acting career is finally taking hold, you have finally moved past your New Kids on the Block stigma, and now your jumping back in? Way to go, dude.

I honestly can't think of a whole lot to say about this. In their day, NKOB were the leading favorites of pre-teen and young teen girls everywhere. Now, those young and pre-teen girls are (presumably) saucy twenty and thirty-somethings, and evidently studies indicate that there is a serious lack of crappy music for them to listen to. Hence, the reunification of all the New Kids. There is a really stupid joke about the New Kids on the Block being the Middle-Aged Men on the Block now, but I won't stoop to that level. That would be wrong, and would not uphold the high comedic standards of TWWoT. Also, I could joke about them being a "Man-Band", which I actually think is sort of funny. Man-Band... pure gold.

Thats right. I initialized it. TWWoT is awesome, and if you sound it out, it sounds dirty, which is unintentionally rad. NKOB on the other hand, just sounds stupid. N-Kob. Stupid. Anyway, there are lots of bands out there that suck, and I guess that NKOB just feels like it is their turn to cash in on sucking. If anything, they were smart to wait until the Backstreet Boys and N'SYNC were completely forgotten. Wait until the competition is irrelevant, and then slide in. Good idea, NKOB!

I guess my greatest fear here is that lesser, and by extension, crappier eighties boy bands will also reunite. Anyone interested in seeing Soul2Soul again? New Edition? (well, actually, probably lots of people would be interested in New Edition...) Are we looking at a resurgence of interest in Tony Toni Tone? Jodeci?

If you don't think I am serious about this being a big fear, consider that MTV reported that fans went "bonkers" upon hearing about the NKOB reunion. Bonkers. MTV actually used the word "bonkers". While I appreciate the happy, light-hearted feeling that bonkers denotes, it creeps me out that MTV would use it. This is, after all, the same channel that airs such shows as "Laguna Hills". One day they should just broadcast a show called "Sexually ambiguous sluts and idiot pretty boys who whine about everything and slap-fight at the drop of a hat" and get it over with. That being said, "Rob and Big" is a pretty good show.

Anyway, I am veering off course with this, so let me conclude and just say that I am horrified that NKOB is reuniting.

TWWoT out.