Tacky Raccoons

Roadtrip 1976

I was back from college on Easter break. The Weasel and I were cruising the southwestern Ohio sticks with a 12-pack, talking trash and listening to 8-track tapes when nature called. I pulled my ‘57 Chevy into a dark parking lot behind an elementary school and stopped.

Before we were out of the car, headlights flashed from the other end of the parking lot and rushed toward us as another car skidded to a stop just behind, blocking us in. The police ordered us out of the car at gunpoint.

Suddenly we didn’t have to pee so bad — we had to pee worse.

Shining a flashlight around the inside of the car (and spotting only the beer) the cop remarked that there were no rocks or baseball bats. Seems that there had been some vandalism at the school, and the police were staking it out.

We explained why we were there, that we’d just stopped to take a leak. The officer said something I’ll never forget: “To go driving around with a friend and having a few beers is okay.”

And with that, he let us go.

[Image from here.]

Latawnya, the Naughty Horse

What a children’s classic, complete with illustrations of horses drinking and smoking. The plot summary of this 29 page work of excellence follows [spoiler alert]:

Latawnya the Naughty Horse comes from a large family, and she and her sisters Daisy and Latoya go out to play where they meet up with some horses that are smoking drugs and drinking alcohol, so Latawnya the Naughty Horse joins them and gets sick. Her sister horses rat her out to her parents. Her father, James, tells her about one of his horse friends who died from an overdose, Latawnya the Naughty Horse says that drugs and and alcohol are bad, and her parent horses kiss and hug her. The End.

There are many questions left unresolved in this pressure cooker, like where do horses get drugs and alcohol and how do they pay for it? Who in their right mind gives horses lighters and matches? How do horses hug? Why did Latawnya, the Naughty Horse, have to try out smoking and drinking first before she came to her own conclusions? Guess we’ll have to wait for the sequel.

[Fully illustrated novel may be reviewed in its entirety here. Found here.]

40 Years Ago Today – Kent State 4 May 1970

[Click on image for source and more photos. Related posts here and here.]

Flight Risk

“‘Scuse me. Can we get a ticket refund? We’ve decided to drive to Europe instead.”

[Image from here.]

[Updated 3 May 2013: Story here, Video here.]

Now More Than Ever, The New and Improved Cutting Edge Wave of the Future Tacky Raccoons Store is Officially Open!

This is blogwhoring at its worst, but it’s blogwhoring in the good sense of the word, and just in time for the Holidays. A simple click on either image will take you to the Official Cutting Edge Wave of the Future New and Improved Now More Than Ever Tacky Raccoons Store for almost all your clothing and caffeine container needs. After all, it’s for the children, and the awesome design is awesome.

With Practice, You Too Can Administer Popular Posterior Vaccinations In Your Spare Time.

Yep. That’s a simulated buttcheek for hypodermic needle training practice, and it tells you if you’ve done it right. That’s right, THIS HALF-ASS SPEAKS.

This strap-on simulator is a lifelike model of a right buttock with anatomical landmarks needed for injections. Correctly administered injections produce audiovisual feedback.

Just think how much fun this could be at frat parties, what with the anatomical landmarks and all… give a shot, take a shot. I hope they come up with a left-handed model.

[Found via here. I won’t link directly as the original source has graphic images for other medical training products that are NSFW/NSFK and kinda nasty otherwise.]

Saturday Matinee – Kooza, Fishbone, Vai, Maceo & Satchmo

Cirque du Soleil is always awesome. Gotta wait for the cool stuff in this vid. [Found at a blog whose name has a lot of t’s and w’s in it.]

Fishbone is/was just nuts. I love ’em.

Steve Vai’s “Love of God” is another awesome rock classic.

Maceo Parker’s “Cold Sweat” is a great groovejam with a great funk lineup.

Louis Armstrong is one of a handful of people that I would have liked to have met. ¡Adiós mis muchachos!

35 Years Ago Today

[Image from here.]

Welcome To The Planet of the Leafblowers

[Found here.]

Tuna Eye for the Gaijin Guy

This just screams “EAT ME!”

“I was at the grocery store and I got the urge to eat something new. I looked around and I didn’t really see much until I found a food that could look back. It was only a hundred yen, which is less than a buck, so I figured I’d give it a whirl. It had a sticker on it that said that it should be cooked, but I didn’t really know how to cook it. I tried to find stuff online, but there aren’t a lot of English webpages devoted to eating fish eyes, so I just decided to boil it.”

Tineye helped track the source of that image of culinary goodness. Jesse hunts for awesome things to eat, eats them and describes the experience.

Update 3 May 2010: This just in from Planet Ross – a matching set!