Friday, January 31, 2014

None Of My Bowls At Home Are All That Great



Broncos vs Seahawks.  Who ya got?!


I plan on watching Puppy Bowl.  The competition is pretty strong this year.


So, here at Jeremy Is In The Office, we encourage the use of sporting events as diversions, particularly hockey.  Football becomes significantly relevant once a year, and that happens this weekend, when they play the big game at the end of the season.  I'm assuming I'm not allowed to say the name because the NFL prohibits people from saying it for any purpose other than paying the NFL for the right to say it.  Seriously...even businesses local to the game Can't Hang Signs Saying The Name even to welcome people to the area.   

Either way, that particular game will be happening on Sunday, which means the pregame show starts later tonight.  I should actually let you know about a video guide to attending the game created by resident New York puppet, Johnny T.  Go ahead and watch that, even if you fully expect to skip the game itself.  

Also worthy of note are prop bets, including the length of the national anthem, as performed by Renee Fleming, whether or not Renee Fleming will wear gloves while performing the national anthem, and what color the gloves will be.  Here's what I want to know.  Nobody knows who Renee Fleming is.  I just looked up a picture of her, and if she passed me on the street on my way home form work today, I wouldn't recognize her.  Is there any reason she shouldn't stop off in Las Vegas or log into some online betting website, bet the ranch on going Under the 139.5 second prop bet (incidentally, I had to look this up too, but "The clock measuring the anthem starts on Fleming’s first note and ends when she has completed the word 'brave.'"), then showing up at the game, singing really fast (not fast enough to disrespect America or anything, but easily under the 139-mark), and going back to collect?  Sure, it's the gambling version of Insider Trading, but if nobody recognizes you, it can't be illegal, right?  

Anyway...enjoy the really important football game.  It's going to be Supe....Stupendous!  

Please don't sue me, NFL...

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

It's Strong? What A Surprise



Rejected State of the Union Speech: “We all know we’re not going to do anything, so who’s up for Scrabble?”  


Today's rant is not sponsored by Hasbro.  Why not?  How about it, Hasbro?


So last night was the big State of the Union speech.   It was the single most important State of the Union speech since last year's, which was the single most important State of the Union speech since the year before that.  You get the idea.  It was a speech.  I didn't watch it.  

More importantly, I didn't watch the increasingly ridiculous parade of response speeches given by the other political party.  This nonsense started fairly recently, in 1966.  Now, it apparently includes a Spanish-language version of the response (by the party interested in deporting immigrants) because they don't get enough of the Spanish-speaking vote, a third response by the extreme fringe of the opposition party, and an online-only response by another guy in the extreme fringe who didn't get picked to give the official extreme fringe response and felt like he didn't get enough TV time.  This is a lot of work to respond to a single speech that accomplishes roughly nothing.  

The net of both speeches is as follows...and please keep in mind, I didn't watch them.  The president wants certain things to happen.  The opposition party claims that those things will destroy America, The American People(tm) don't want them, so they're going to stop the president from doing those things.  In return, they will provide a remarkably limited number of their own ideas (83% of which will be in the form of a Voucher Program), and the other party doesn't want those things because they will destroy America, and The American People(tm) don't want them.  As a result, nothing will happen, but plenty of TV time will be devoted to talking about how nothing is happening and who is to blame and why they should be voted out of office in the 2014 election, and more importantly, the 2016 election.  

In the meantime, all of these people will have jobs and get face time on TV and be on talk radio programs and make campaign trips instead of actually doing...you know...work.  That's okay, because we've actually come to expect that...which brings me to my main point.  

The president knows he's not going to get anything accomplished this year.  Congress knows they're not going to get anything accomplished this year.  We all know that neither of them are going to get anything accomplished this year.  So why go through the exercise of telling us what you want to accomplish this year?  Lose the stupid facade already and just admit that you have no expectations of any real accomplishments.  At least that way, none of you will be lying and need to go on TV incessantly to tell me how the other one is lying.  I stopped listening long ago. 

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

I Got It For Christmas



Lots of realtors want to sell my house.  But...I’m not done living in it yet


That's what you think.  Pack your things.  I'm going to need you out by the end of the month.


That is so not how real estate works.  


Can't blame a guy for trying.


So, I'm not entirely sure why, maybe the economy is picking up or something, but I've gotten a bizarre spike in mail lately from realtors.  Not email, mind you...that, I can delete with no problems...but actual mail.  Like, the kind I have to walk to the end of my driveway to look at.  What a hassle.  Anyway, many of these mails are the same.  They're addressed to me, one was even hand-written, or at least printed in such a way to make it look hand-written.  I can't authenticate that, because I don't have local handwriting experts like that pawn shop show...the one in Las Vegas, not the one where Everybody Gets Thrown Into The Parking Lot I may have digressed a little.   

Anyway, all of these mailings are the same.  They all want to be my realtor and sell my house.  They promise to get the best price for it and to work really hard to sell it for me.  That's very nice of them, really, but it leaves out one seemingly important aspect.  I don't want to sell my house.  

For the time being, I'm quite content living where I am.  It's a nice house in a very pleasant neighborhood, I have payments I can afford, and it's reasonably close to work.  I really have no reason to want to move.  Moving is a major hassle anyway.  There would need to be some really compelling reason for me to sell my house right now.  Something at least a little better than some guy wanting to be my realtor. 

Friday, January 24, 2014

How About It, Nabisco?



Double Stuf Oreos do not, in fact, contain double the Stuf as the originals.  This is an outrage


You know...with the 24-hour news cycle we have going on these days, the level of manufactured outrage is a little ridiculous.  But this one seems to have gone unnoticed, and I have no idea why.  


Indeed.  Last year, a High School Math Class performed an experiment on the amount of creme filling (or "Stuf") in Oreo cookies, coming to the conclusion that the self-proclaimed "Double Stuf" Oreos contained 1.86x the mount of Stuf as the original recipe.  Close, sure, but predictably not double, as the advertisement tells us.  Just one more way corporate America is putting the screws to the little guy.  

Speaking of America...

I unfortunately have to cut my Oreo diatribe a little short today to bring you important news that will cause even further outrage.


Geeze, Jeremy.  All this outrage on a Friday?  


I know, I know...but this can't wait.  
The US Olympic committee, in association with soon-to-be-disgraced fashion designer Ralph Lauren "proudly" unveiled the official uniform for Team USA's march in the Opening Ceremony.  It is Unbelievably Awful.  I've started discussions with some folks at work here to see about getting honorary citizenship to their countries for the duration of the opening ceremonies just so I don't have to be associated with that ridiculous monstrosity.  So far, I've been turned down by Canada, but hopes are still alive for Bosnia.  Seriously...that thing is like Uncle Sam drank a little too much and barfed America all over an Ugly Christmas Sweater.  Also...white pants after Labor Day?  What's up with that? 

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Same With "High In The Upper 30s"



Here’s the problem with Celsius: Zero degrees doesn’t have the same connotation as it does in Fahrenheit 


As opposed to the problem with Fahrenheit in that it's a largely arbitrary measurement?


Fahrenheit is certainly not arbitrary!    The Fahrenheit scale is derived from the temperature delta between freezing water mixed with salt, which was set to 0 degrees, and standard human body temperature, which was set to 96 degrees.  Why 96, you say?  Well, 96 is 12 times 8, which makes it really easy to divide the interval into 12 parts and then each part into 8 segments called degrees.  Based on this scale, the boiling point of water was determined to be 212 degrees.  Later on, more accurate and linear thermometers were developed and body temperature was found to be more along the lines of 98.6 degrees.  

Celsius is just as arbitrary, using water and the earth as the base for measurement (and other measurements, as you may or may not be aware).  It's true.  The entire metric system is based on a single measurement...the circumference of the earth, and a single liquid...water.  A meter was originally defined as 1 ten millionth of the distance from the north pole to the equator.  (The exact definition has technically changed since then, but it's still pretty much the same distance)  Sticking with water, if we arbitrarily decide that the freezing point of water is 0, and the boiling point is 100, then we have the basis for the Cesius, or Centigrade temperature scale...but why use water?  Anyway...one cubic centimeter is the same as one milliliter, and one milliliter of water weighs one gram, so the original distance measurement gives us both volume and weight measurements (under standard conditions, of course), as long as we're still using the arbitrarily decided-upon water.  Going even further, one Calorie (technically kilo-calorie, but that's splitting hairs) is the amount of energy required to heat one milliliter of water one degree C.  The entire system is based on water...which seems a little bizarre.  Sure, it's pretty abundant and essential, but it's far from the most basic thing we have available.  I think a new system should be developed using the speed of light as a basis for distance and Carbon the single element for creating the other measurements.  And start at Absolute Zero for temperature.  Stick with the basics!  (Unrelated, I totally need to start a band called "Minus One Kelvin")  When somebody figures this out, call it the "Jeremy Scale.

So this call comes into play when discussing temperature, particularly outdoor temperature.  When watching a weather forecast in the US, we see temperatures displayed in Fahrenheit.  We're used to it.  We have a feel for it.  When you watch a weather forecast in the rest of the world, the temperature is displayed in Celsius.  They're used to it and have a feel for it.  So why is it more than a simple acclimation time to get used to numbers that mean something different?  Well, for the simple reason of connotation.  When we see a forecast in the US, and the meteorologist says "Zero degrees," or "Sub-Zero temperatures," we know to fear.  The number zero means something to us...that number is synonymous with oppressively cold temperatures.  Zero degrees Celsius doesn't do that.  The freezing point of water really isn't all that cold, in the grand scheme of things.  When it's zero C outside, you're okay with it.  You know you have to wear a coat and maybe a hat and gloves, but there's no abject terror.  For the equivalent in oppressively cold temperatures in metric, you have to go down to -17 degrees.  And that, dear readers, is a really weird arbitrary number to try to remember. 

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Syrup Comes From Canada. It's Cold There, Too



I think people are getting sick of French Toast Days by now


This is categorically untrue.  Everybody loves French Toast!  Especially breakfast for dinner...that's a special treat.  Incidentally, I'm hungry now.  


French Toast Days have nothing to do with actually eating French Toast, although I suppose there's nothing prohibiting that.  French Toast Days are the days right before a major, cataclysmic weather event where people flock to grocery stores and stock up on all the bread, milk, eggs, and Oxford Commas.  Three of which are the key ingredients to French Toast.


Pro Tip:  Add a teaspoon of Vanilla Extract to your egg batter before you dip the bread in.  You're welcome.


So, as you may be aware, there is a major, cataclysmic weather event happening in the Greater Jeremy Area which promises to dump the worst show accumulation of the week all over everything.  We could be seeing final snow totals of up to 3 inches around here.  As you might expect, all of the schools have closed early, everything's cancelled for tonight, and people are deciding how early they're going to leave work.  

What's unfortunate is the sheer number of times this kind of crap has happened already this winter, and it's only January.  We're sick of snow days and stupid cold temperatures.  It's time to move somewhere warm.  Who's with me!?

Friday, January 17, 2014

Future Deja Vu



To celebrate Major League Baseball’s expansion of Instant Replay, I’m going to use this same Sametime Status Message tomorrow, too!


I think the best part of this Sametime Status is that you're recycling electrons.  Recycling is good for the environment.  Good for you, Jeremy!


Thanks! 


Of course, tomorrow is also Saturday, you won't be working, and you won't have a Sametime Status, so that somewhat renders your point moot.


That's completely irrelevant, if you ask me.  
Anyway, Major League Baseball announced that they're going to be taking a break from publicly shaming steroid users and actually try something that will improve the game.  They've expanded the use of instant replay during games so that the umpires will get three or four more calls right this season.  This seems to be a wonderful use of their time.

That said, the expanded use of instant replay will, in and of itself, directly cause me to watch precisely zero more baseball games than I had planned on watching already (which was somewhere in the zero range, truth be told), so I don't know how much of an effect this will really have on the game as a whole. 

Thursday, January 16, 2014

This Made Me Sadder Than You Think



Here’s a Fun Fact!  Jefferies Tubes were specifically named for use in Star Trek


Jeremy thought they were an actual thing.  He's awesome like that.


So here's my problem with fiction.  I make the assumption that the fiction is at least based on some sort of fact.  Let's take Star Trek, for instance.  I have no trouble believing in the communicator devices or the little tablet computers they always seemed to have kicking around.  In fact, we've already met or exceeded that technology some 200 years early.  Go, humanity!  I'm also pretty convinced that a matter-antimatter annihilation reactor would generate a tremendous amount of energy, which in turn could cause a warp in the space-time continuum, rendering warp drive possible.  We're not there yet, But We're Not Entirely Far Off.  Space ships?  Okay.  Laser pistols, sure.  Extra-terrestrial life forms, why not?  

All of these things are (or were) stretches from reality, but they were based on the reality of the day, so we just took them as truth.  Ship's components were pretty standard fare.  You had the bridge, with the captain's chair, the helm, a brig, the engine room (or "main engineering"), the quarters, the bulkheads and so on and so forth.  They also included maintenance access ports called "Jefferies Tubes."  This was the name, and who was I to believe that they didn't exist in ships already?  I'm not an expert in nautical or aerospace design.  I'm sure there are maintenance ports in boats and planes...so I made the completely unconscious jump to believe that they were called Jefferies Tubes, that they had always been called Jefferies Tubes, and they would be called Jefferies Tubes right through to the 24th century Galaxy-Class Starships.  

Well, file this under "Things You Learn While Doing Other Things," but I learned recently, much to my dismay, that Jefferies Tubes were named after Matt Jefferies, the production designer of Star Trek: The Original Series.  They were never a real thing in any vehicle prior to the original Enterprise.  What a letdown. 

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Like This Post!



So apparently, I got a new thermostat recently.  I didn’t know about it, but I didn’t opt out


Wow.  Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.  You know this Blag is hosted on The Google, right?  


Well, yes.  But I assume the fine, upstanding folks at The Google will understand a little comedy and satire.  Especially when everything I say on this Blag is 100% truth at all times.


Maybe only 83% of the time.


Either way...this is true.  
So you may be aware that there has been a "smart" thermostat on the market for a little while called "Nest."  It supposedly learns your schedule and the weather and stuff, making smarter decisions on heating your home which supposedly saves you money over the long run.  I'm okay with the concept, but never really wanted to make the initial investment to buy the thing...it's pretty expensive, and I already have a programmable thermostat in my house, so I didn't really see the need.  I used a very passive method of not having a new thermostat.  

Historically, I also used a very passive method of not having a new social media outlet in that I never signed up for Google Plus.  It's like Facebook for people who don't like Facebook...especially the whole part about social interaction, because Nobody Uses Google Plus.  Turns out, this tacit rejection was not an effective enough method, apparently.  At some point, Google went and signed everybody up for Google Plus who had a gmail email address.  Since this Blag is on The Google, it has a gmail address...and subsequently, a Google Plus account.  I've never seen it.  Lately, The Google has been taking a lot of guff for a certain privacy setting built into Google Plus that lets anybody send you an email to your gmail account through your Google Plus page, regardless of whether or not they know you.  It's a bit of a Spamming loophole, and people on the Internets are freaking out over it.  Of course, the setting to disable this practice is available, but you have to log into your Google Plus page to disable it.  Your personal information is 100% public unless you specifically tell a social media outlet you didn't know you had that you don't want it telling everybody your personal information.  Super.  

I told you that story so I can tell you this joke.  The Google recently bought the company that produces the aforementioned "Nest" home thermostat.  So you now have one, whether you know it or not.  If you don't want it, you can log into the thing and opt out of the service, but you probably don't know how.  Good luck, suckers! 

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Now I Want A Burrito



Rolfing isn’t what you think it is 


It sounds like something that happens after you eat one too many Burritos Supreme at Taco Bell.


One Burrito Supreme at Taco Bell isn't too many?  


 Depends on your criteria, I guess...but my point remains valid.


And my point remains correct.  Rolfing has nothing to do with either vomiting, or frisbee golf.  It's actually a type of holistic medicine dealing with muscle alignment and structural integration or something.  It's akin to a type of massage that separates the fibres of muscle connective tissues in order to allow more natural movement of the muscles.  The process was named after the founder of the practice, Ida Rolf.  


I'da rolf too, if I ate that many Burritos.


Of course, the whole process is incredibly long, complicated, and expensive.  A complete treatment takes between 10 and 15 hours and costs $80 per hour based on a Groupon I was emailed last week.  To become a trained Rolfer requires a full year of training at a cost of over $10,000 at a single clinic in Colorado.   The practice has also been scientifically proven to accomplish absolutely nothing, though dozens of people have offered testimonials to its effectiveness.  If nothing else, it appears to be remarkably effective at taking your money...which is not what you thought it did. 

Monday, January 13, 2014

It's True! All Cows do Eat Grass!


Is there some kind of mnemonic device that lets you remember how to spell mnemonic?


It's not overly straight-forward, is it?  


So mnemonic devices are simple, yet sometimes remarkably inane ways to memorize things, usually lists.  For example, the order of the planets can be remembered using the phrase "My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas," or the more current "My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Noodles," since Pluto's unfortunate demotion.  For some reason, people are more able to remember that nonsensical phrase than "Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and possibly Pluto."  Hooray, Oxford Comma!  

The same holds true for fictional mnemonic person Roy G Biv, which is a name nobody has ever heard outside of mnemonic devices.  Roy reminds us the order of colors in the spectrum is "Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet," even though this particular list is the only place you will ever use the word "indigo" to describe a color.  There Is Proof.

Either way, mnemonic is a difficult word to spell.  In fact, I've only gotten it right once while typing this...of course, I misspelled "typing" while typing that sentence, so I'm not necessarily the best example on this topic.  Like a handful of other words that have a bizarre silent letter to start, like pneumonia or psychology, mnemonic starts with a letter completely other than the sound the word makes at the beginning.  I have no idea how to remember this, so unless somebody comes up with a pithy mnemonic device for this, I'm afraid I'm going to have to rely on spellcheckers.  We awl no how well that can Gogh.  

Friday, January 10, 2014

I Need To Stop Reading The News



So I understand the Governor of New Jersey has a bridge he’d like to sell…


But who'd want to buy it?  It's in New Jersey.


I guess that's tangential to the point.  What we have going on recently in the world of manufactured political scandal is BridgeGate!  Or WaterBridge!  Or whatever moronic conglomeration of words involving "Water" and/or "Gate" people use to name manufactured political scandals these days.

For those unawares, and to be unawares, you need to be living in a cave and probably not reading self-proclaimed comedy blags on the internets, the governor of New Jersey, who is inexplicably compared to Kate Upton In This Article, didn't know that somebody on his staff managed to close some lanes on a bridge to New York.  This led to the horrible tragedy of people being late in New York.  The reason these lanes were closed is apparently, the mayor of the town the bridge is in didn't support the governor's reelection...perhaps because the governor is from the opposite political party.  

So, this is the political equivalent of putting somebody's hand in a bucket of warm water while they're sleeping, and it's all the governor's fault...if the over-sensationalized media are to be believed.  Conversely, if the other side of the over-sensationalized media are to be believed, the over-sensationalized media are only focusing on this story to draw your attention away from the REAL scandal of some other over-sensationalized nonsense that's being done by the other political party.  I hope that sentence made sense, but I can't be bothered to proofread.  

So, the governor had a press conference where he had to apologize a few times and say that he's sad about 83 million times, and all will be forgiven...until, of course, the governor actually tries to do something silly like...you know....govern.  Then, his political opponents will be all too eager to jump all over BridgeGate as an example of how the governor is ruining the state/country/economy/way of life/freedom/Christmas and they will proceed to do nothing.  

Ladies and Gentlemen....the current state of politics. 

Thursday, January 9, 2014

It's A Sad Day



ALERT!  Bird Flu has claimed its first North American victim


It's a sad and sobering day for all of us.  Bird Flu has officially spread to North America.  We really have to wonder how long until it gets to all of us.


Indeed.  We all knew this day was coming, of course.  That doesn't make this terrible news any easier to take.  We are now one step closer to the inevitable Bird Flu pandemic we've feared for a long long time.  
So yesterday came reports from Vancouver that an unidentified Canadian citizen contracted the H5N1 Bird Flu while traveling abroad, became sick and died last week.  Tests confirmed this week that the cause of death was indeed Avian Influenza, and the media storm commenced.  Nobody knows how many people this poor traveler came in contact with on their flight from China to Vancouver, nor whether or not this horrible virus has mutated to be transmitted easily.  All we do know is that North America, formerly on high alert for Bird Flu, has officially received its first casualty in what is sure to be a long and unwinnable war. 

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Seemed Like A Good Idea



So after all these years of making TVs thinner, now they’re curved to make them thick again?


The screen itself is still very thin.  I guess that's something.


So this week brings us the annual 2014 Consumer Electronics Show in sunny Las Vegas.  It's a bit of a party for nerds as giant tech companies and upstarts alike unveil what they promise to be the next great thing in electronic entertainment and productivity.   

Sure, the big announcement a couple years ago was 3D TVs and that flopped horribly, but you have to give them points for trying. 

Anyway, there doesn't appear to be much in the way of revolutionary innovation this year, as the biggest themes coming out of the show are new TVs.  They're no longer 3D, but they're bigger than before, they have more pixels than before, have screens that are more curved than before.  That's about it.  Even Michael Bay Can't Explain Why It's Better.  

What I don't understand is the fact that we've spent so long getting TVs that are thin so we can hang them on the wall and they don't take up space anymore, and now we need to curve the screen inward so the edges stick out away from the wall to take up space again.  From a form factor point of view, we're now officially going backwards.  I guess all that's important is that a new TV is out, and I'm supposed to buy one.  All it costs is...uhm...how much?


70 Thousand dollars. 


Dear Lord, you've got to be kidding me.  Forget it.

Monday, January 6, 2014

Ugli Fruit Is Much More Appropriate



I’m strangely indifferent about Passion Fruit


How could you?  Passion fruit is the greatest thing since...oh wait...I see what you did there.  


This came about not all that long ago as I was poring over the selection of flavored teas in the drawer in my office.  


I think that's enough about you going through your drawers.  


I have one that's Passion-Fruit based...with mango flavor as well, I guess.  It's not that great.  I probably had pretty high hopes for the stuff when I bought it, since I really like mango, and people tend to like passion fruit, but I don't seem to have a whole lot of use for it.  It's not that the stuff tastes bad (I'll leave that up to the Strawberry Pomegranate.  Awful stuff.  Just awful.), it's just that I'm entirely indifferent about it. 
It made me think of just how passionate I'm not about passion fruit and decided that it's a pretty substantial misnomer, at least as far as I'm concerned.  Maybe there are people out there who are truly passionate about it, and if you're one of them, do let me know.  Until then, I'm sticking with blueberry. 

Friday, January 3, 2014

It's A Problem

I'm now concerned about the fact that my bottle of ketchup looks like my bottle of honey


You know, they don't really taste the same.  Hopefully you solved your issue before it got too serious?


Thankfully, yes.

See, not all that long ago, somebody realized that certain, more viscous fluids, don't really lend themselves to squeeze bottles.  There is an awful lot of holding the thing upside down and shaking and squeezing and gassy noises involved before you really start to see results.  Ketchup and honey were among these fluids.  A new solution was required!  Behold the upside-down squeeze bottle.  The bottle is stored with the product at the entrance for easier access, and the lid is designed so that the bottle can stand on it.  It has a little vinyl valve at the bottom that prevent leaks until you actually squeeze, and success!  Many products have caught on with this concept, including the aforementioned honey and ketchup, but also mayonnaise, mustard, various other dressings, and cheese.

I happen to have at least two of these in my house.  As you may have guessed, ketchup and honey.  I store them in the same cupboard.  I store them right next to each other because that's how the tessellation works out best in that particular cupboard.  This morning, while making tea in my usual morning stupor, I grabbed an upside-down bottle, assuming it was honey.  Fortunately, I always measure my honey out into a spoon, so I realized I had grabbed ketchup before my tea became a tomato and vinegar-based disaster. 

I think I need to buy ketchup in the old-fashioned right-side-up bottles from now on.

Thursday, January 2, 2014

This Is The Year We Get Bought Out By Comedy Central!

Happy New Year from Jeremy's Sametime Status!


I'd say Happy New Year back, but I don't really feel like talking to a Sametime Status.  It's not exactly real.


Neither are you.


That's beside the point entirely.  


So here we are, at the dawn of 2014.  A whole new year chock full of possibilities and checks with the wrong year written on them because really, nobody writes that many checks anymore.  I mean, if it wasn't for the local water department charging a 2 dollar "Convenience Fee" to pay online, I wouldn't pay any bills by check anymore.  How about it, town water department?  Get with the times and let me pay online without your bullcrap! 

I may have gotten off track. 


There does exist that possibility, yes.  


Anyway, since many of you know I made a New Year's Resolution a few years back to never again make New Year's Resolutions, and I fully intend to stick to that one, I can make no promises about the year of fresh all-new content waiting for you on the Blag here.  I know tomorrow's Sametime Status is a pretty good one, and there will be at least one Theme Week coming before too long here, but much beyond that, we just get to play it by ear.  I will, of course, pledge to make every effort to provide you with a whole year of the type of thoughtful and classy comedy stylings you've come to expect from Jeremy Is In The Office...


When did we start lying to the readers?  


 I'll also probably throw in a clunker every now and again.  Just so you're aware. 

So to all of you Loyal Readers out there, good riddance to 2013, and it's now officially full steam ahead for 2014!