Ring Ring BANG BANG

I have previously mentioned the stupidity of having a cell phone that looks like a gun.

No to complete the circle of dumb... I give you: the gun that looks like a cell phone.

"Community Gun"

I have heard of a community garden, a community kitchen, and even a community cat.  You know, pretty much anything in a shared area that different people in the community look after.  But I had no idea that this concept also applies to guns, apparently widely enough to be blithely referenced in a news headline.

So basically this is a gun left in some easily accessible area that different people can come and get to use as they see fit.  And it is a widespread enough concept that various states have laws against the practice or buy-back programs targeting them. I think I would be happier, honestly, not knowing that irresponsibility with guns goes so much further than I imagined.

Fab.com and Gun Chic Cliches

I am getting very very tired of Fab.com featuring design after design based on guns.  Even if you are not disgusted by gun chic and gangster kids shooting other innocent kids on a daily basis it is a design cliche.

Time to try just a little harder, please?

The same could be said for the perky but clearly generic reply I got when I emailed them about this concern. If you aren't going to make any effort to personalize the response you might as well use an auto-responder that says: 'we want your money, not your opinions'.

Examples shown are from today's Fab email, similar examples from (on average) every Fab email over the last month.

Kea Serial Killer

Some one is shooting the Keas, a much loved New Zealand parrot. A total of six dead birds have been found, out of an estimated total population of less than 1000.

I hope the cops catch this bastard soon.  An apt punishment might involve being staked out naked in Kea territory.

Classic Covers: Kiss Me, Deadly

My first thought, upon seeing this cover, was that the lady in the dressing gown was offering the dude a rather easy choice: lead or booby. But even if the platinum crayon is not the sharpest in the box, that isn't a very likely scenario.

Upon consideration I decided that she must have just pulled the revolver out of her robe. But that doesn't really scan either. You can't tuck a heavy gun in a lightly-tied terry-cloth sash. And pulling it out rapidly would probably result in seriously chafed nipple, a hole in your robe... oh, and blowing your own foot off.

I must admit to never having read this Mike Hammer classic, is there really a scene like the one shown on the cover? I have to read the damn thing and find out. I don't remember anything fo the sort in the movie (1955) (which drops the patently unecessary comma in the title). But honestly it is the nightmare inducing final act that sticks in my mind rather than the rampantly noir femme-fatale-ing along the way.