You’re always welcome at Owl Chatter, Volodymyr! Don’t wait for an invitation.
Missing no opportunity to exhibit his moral depravity, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy refused to grant Owl Chatter Hall-Of-Fame inductee Volodymyr Zelensky an opportunity to address the House on his visit to DC. Here’s what McCarthy was quoted in the NYT as saying: “Is Zelensky elected to Congress? Is he our president? I don’t think I have to commit to anything. Where is the accountability on the money we already spent? What is the plan for victory? I think that’s what the American public wants to know.”
It also wants to know how a jackass like you could rise to such prominence. According to the Times, it was just a few months ago that McCarthy spoke forcefully about his commitment to Ukraine.
So stop by if you’re in Jersey, VZ — have some borscht with us! Please bring Olena if she’s with you. And, BTW, how did you ever get such a hot babe to fall for a slob like you??!!
So, you all know Hasan Minhaj, right? The comic?
He has a bit in which he says that after the government passed the Patriot Act in the wake of 9/11, an undercover F.B.I. informant named Brother Eric infiltrated his childhood mosque and had dinner at his house. Minhaj recalls how he sniffed him out and, in a prank, asked about getting a pilot’s license, which led to a police officer throwing him against a car.
The New Yorker found that there was such a man working in counterterrorism but that Minhaj never met him. So Minhaj has been getting sh*t for lying about it. He defended his fabrications as fibs in service to “emotional truth.” I think a better defense would be:
“Hello? I’m a comedian, remember? I’m going for laughs: this isn’t the nightly news.”
There’s a story in today’s Times by Jason Zinoman about the “muddy relationship between comedy and truth.”
C’mon, folks — believe me — as someone who tries to get laughs while teaching Federal Income Taxation to accounting students — it ain’t easy. Lying about stuff, making a fool of yourself, insulting people — you grab at anything to get a chuckle. And if you get one, maybe out of ten tries — it makes it all worth it. So let’s give Minhaj a break, shall we?
To her credit, the story states: “Amid plenty of critics online, Whoopi Goldberg was one of the few major figures who spoke up for Minhaj, saying on ‘The View’ that embellishing in the name of a larger truth is what comics do.” And Jerry Seinfeld has said that all of his comedy is made up — even his opinions. Zinoman writes: “Stand-up comedy was never expected to be factually accurate. Rodney Dangerfield, to be clear, got respect.”
Today’s poem in The Writer’s Almanac is by Mary Oliver and it’s called “Don’t Hesitate.”
If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy,
don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty
of lives and whole towns destroyed or about
to be. We are not wise, and not very often
kind. And much can never be redeemed.
Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this
is its way of fighting back, that sometimes
something happens better than all the riches
or power in the world. It could be anything,
but very likely you notice it in the instant
when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the
case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid
of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.
In the Style section of the Times today, Dilara Findikoglu, a name that you might think was arrived at by randomly pounding on a keyboard, was described as London’s “buzziest young designer.” Margot Robbie wore a pink minidress by Dilara at a Barbie premiere after-party, and Hari Nef wore a nonpink dress of hers at a Barbie premiere (see the latter, below). But the story was all about how Dilara had to cancel out of a major London fashion show due to financial difficulties after months of preparation. Her plight highlights how hard it is to survive as an independent fashion designer in the current climate, even if you’re “buzzy.”
The dress Nef wore is called the Joan’s Knives dress because it’s inspired by a vision of Joan of Arc returning from the dead for revenge, and because it’s festooned with knives “painstakingly set onto a curve-hugging black sheath.” She said the hardest part was packing it into a bag that fit into the overhead compartment. [No she didn’t.]
After Nef wore it, Emma Corrin wore it on the cover of ES magazine, with a fork sticking out of her hair. ES Magazine is an iconic brand designed for sophisticated, culturally-aware Londoners published by the Evening Standard, hence the “ES.” What’s the sophisticated part here — the fork?
Some commenters on Rex’s blog are asked to check off a box stating that he or she is not a robot. Commenter B$$$ asked today how checking off the box proves that you are not a robot. I try to be helpful when I can, so I posted the following response:
Checking off the box saying you are not a robot proves that you are not a robot because if you were a robot you would not check off the box saying you are not a robot because you are a robot. At least no self-respecting robot would. That leaves open the possibility of a rogue robot. But that’s too dispiriting to contemplate — let’s not go there.
The puzzle was wonderful today, although Welly and Wilma have bones to pick. The revealer was “Seasonal phenomenon depicted six times in this puzzle,” and the answer was WINTER MIGRATION. Then, at six places, an answer going across suddenly turned downwards (or “south”) and that part of the answer was a type of bird. Everybody’s favorite was “Infamous presidential denial,” which was Nixon’s I AM NOT CROOK. And it turned down after the C to finish up with ROOK. WES CRAVEN turned after the C to finish with RAVEN. DICK CLARK, finished with the LARK. IN ESCROW finished with CROW; MOHAWK with HAWK, and HALF INCH with FINCH. Get it? Those birds were all heading south for the winter.
Some of the nit pickers noted that not all of those birds are migratory. And it’s a fall migration. But as the saying goes: it’s close enough for crosswords. The more important complaint was Welly’s and Wilma’s — would it have killed them to fit in an owl? So many words end in OWL. Maybe next time, kids.
It was a rare “two-post” day for me on Rex’s blog. In addition to the robot post, above, one commenter (egsforbreakfast) used the “I don’t want to harp on it” pun. So my second post was:
egs — you reminded me of a visit I paid to my sister in Boston during which she took me to a harp recital. We were chatting with the harpist afterwards and I told her the one harp joke I know — that harpists spend half their lives tuning their harps, and the other half playing them out of tune.
She may have heard it before. How else to explain her failing to explode with laughter?
One clue/answer I didn’t understand until Rex explained it was “Capital of Washington,” and the answer was ONES. Think money for “capital,” and George for “Washington,” not DC — so Washington is on the one-dollar bill, hence ONES.
“Desert near Sinai” was NEGEV. I knew the answer but I didn’t know (or forgot) that NEGEV means “south.” So it subtly fits in with the puzzle’s theme.
At 27A, “Rubber overshoe” was GALOSH. Some folks said it looked funny as a singular and they had only seen it as galoshes. But the dictionary has it in singular form. I’m not going to quibble.
Gotta keep those footsies dry!
Enough nonsense for today? See you tomorrow!
The Wellington Files 