Most of the caption contests here use pictures loaded with randomness, but this week I’m going to use a political photo, so we can try to make some political humor. This photo is of President Barack Obama relaxing, while his Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is on the phone. I have no idea what the actual context of this picture is, but who needs context? We get to make it up, which is what makes it fun!
Just remember to keep the comments funny and clean. You can make political statements, but make them funny (whether laugh-out-loud or satire or irony). This isn’t the place for serious long-winded rants about why your preferred political party is great and/or the other party siphons. (Comments violating this rule may be deleted, per the site’s rules.) Of course you can reference current political events, or you can make up any context you want. Have fun with it!
(To see the other caption contests, click on the “Say What?” category in the sidebar.)
Baking a turkey has long been part of most Americans’ Thanksgiving tradition. But let’s face it — it’s kinda boring to watch a turkey bake. Plus turkey is healthy and not very fattening, which doesn’t fit in with our modern culture. So now more and more people are deep-frying their turkey, which makes it more unhealthy (along with more flavorful), and there’s also the danger of deep-frying it improperly, which is exciting for some people.
I’ve heard so many reports of deep-fried turkey disasters in recent years that it seems like it’s becoming a sport. There are probably countless videos on YouTube of this, but here’s a few highlights I’ve come across.
In the following video, note the lack of protective gear, and also notice the child in the background covering his eyes. Somehow he knew something was going to go wrong. And somehow this accident even inspired a dance from the man responsible for it.
This next video features firefighters showing the right and wrong way to deep-fry a turkey. First, they do it correctly, with it fully thawed and dry. Next they drop a partially thawed turkey in the deep-fryer. Then they put a mostly frozen turkey in the deep-fryer. Lastly, they show you what happens if you pour water on an oil fire. (The last part is quite impressive, because it’s not near my house.)
This next one is great. This “chef” uses the Archimedes Principle to properly deep-fry a turkey. (That’s a great line. I had never heard it used like that, and there may be a reason why.) Then at the end, he says, calmly, “We are now frying a turkey.” Perhaps, but he’s also burning a turkey… and his deep-fryer… and the house…
In this next video, we start with the fire already burning. Several people are yelling, “Use a fire extinguisher!” At least one person has the knowledge to say it should be one made for oil fires. (There are different kinds of fire extinguishers, if you didn’t know.) You might be able to guess whether this was the right kind or not. I like how at the end one guy says, “It’s fine”, after it’s been on-fire over a minute and they’ve sprayed it down with a fire extinguisher (which might not be good for food).
Think you’ve seen everything there is to see regarding turkey frying accidents? In the next video, some morning show radio DJs simulate the dangers of deep-frying a turkey (improperly) inside your living room. Somewhere, Fire Marshall Bill is smiling…
BTW, this may look cool, but you shouldn’t try this at home.
If you know much about weather, you know that mankind does not possess the ability to stop a hurricane. Hurricanes are kinda like a migraine headache in that regard — unstoppable once it gets going. In fact, a migraine feels kinda like a hurricane in your head. Or a tornado. But I digress.
Anyway, we cannot stop a hurricane once it gets started. I’ve heard that Hurricane Katrina contained the energy equivalent of 150,000 atomic bombs, and released enough of that energy to power the United States for a year. Amazing! If only we could capture a fraction of that power. But that’s another discussion. (I almost digressed again…)
So obviously the key to stopping a hurricane is to prevent it from forming. That may sound impossible, and it almost is, but I learned from The Discovery Channel where hurricanes (affecting the U.S.) come from. The whole process starts from hot, dry air from the Sahara Desert. Pockets of that hot, dry air get released over the ocean about every three days, and then convection and evaporation and condensation and stuff take place, and hurricanes are formed. So one possible solution would be to destroy the Sahara Desert. I know, that sounds crazy, but think about it — the climate of the Sahara is such that its inhabitants have to live elsewhere. So who would it inconvenience? It would save a lot of money when we don’t have destructive hurricanes!
I can see some people opposing that plan. Fortunately there’s another potential way to stop hurricanes. During the convection process, clouds form and begin to rotate because of the rotation of the Earth. So obviously if we stopped the Earth’s rotation, that would prevent hurricanes from forming. However, this plan would have some major side-effects, like perhaps altering gravity, and we might lose the Moon. I’m sure some other bad things would happen too, so I can see this idea being vetoed.
Perhaps instead of destroying the Sahara Desert, we should just cover it with solar panels to capture the heat. And since the Sahara Desert is one of the hottest places in the world, this could also reduce global warming, and it would be a clean, green, unlimited, renewable energy solution. Sounds perfect, right? That could be quite expensive, which is probably why it hasn’t been done. But it would produce untold amounts of clean energy, which everyone wants these days. Since a large up-front investment is needed, you can start sending in donations, and I’ll do this whenever I get enough money, and it’ll be a win-win for everyone. You can give using various denominations of cash, check, credit card, and bacon.
If you ever glance at the counter near the bottom of the sidebar, you might’ve noticed that yesterday we went over 300,000 hits / pageviews. That’s quite an accomplishment, I think. Perhaps that will prevent certain other bloggers from calling this blog obscure (not that we listen to them anyway, especially when they don’t even visit their own blog!).
Anyway, I think this calls for a celebration. It’s a big milestone (albeit arbitrarily chosen, but it’s a large round number with many round numbers). I suspect many blogs never reach that many viewers.
I’d like to take all the regular readers out for pizza, but unfortunately it’s not in the budget. Actually, there is no budget, because there is no money. Nobody has made any donations. And that’s okay, because we don’t ask for donations. We’ll gladly receive them, should anyone feel generous, but we don’t ask for your money. We like to keep the humor here free, where all can enjoy and participate for no charge. So that’s why there’s no pizza party.
It’s not just a few posts that get a lot of pageviews — there are actually 33 posts that each have over 1,000 views. That’s amazing to me, that so many people have read my ramblings! I’m sure most of you regulars can guess what the top posts are, but how many of the top 10 could you name? Here’s the listing:
Have you read all of those? (I wonder how many of the regular readers have read everything here. You should get a gold star!)
Of course, these are not necessarily the top 20 posts in terms of quality, but the public has spoken. Is your favorite post missing? (Or does anyone even have a favorite post?)