You're talking nothing but BLATHERSKITE!

What's the word I'm thinking of? Today it's...

BLATHERSKITE [BLAT-er-skite] (noun)

1. A babbling, foolish person
2. Absurd and foolish talk

"Oh, that's nothing but blatherskite!" cried Miranda when Viola suggested that Mr. Crave might only be interested in her fortune."



TWITO, page 22

Brain Dump

Go for the gold coin operated vending machine part two by two three blind mice eat cheese sandwich shop till you drop dead in the water park the car in the lot of money is the root canal boat dock your pay the piper. Face the music hall monitor your blood pressure point your gun barrel of monkeys around the world class clown suit yourself. Pass the salt water fish fry the egg cup of coffee pot calling the kettle black tie event horizon. Fasten your seat belt one out of your mind your own business meeting someone new age before beauty.

Brain Dump

It very well may be time to stop, because you need to get started. This means to begin exactly where the rest of the exercise might advise waiting. "We" will overcome this quirk of nature in the middle of a mystery, which posits that a monster is any unreal human on the horizon, an entity not visible when the perspective is inside out. We see such a quasi-religious "scene" whenever we observe stupid [human] activity being immersed, for example, in the emanations of a musical group, whose aficionados elevate lamentations to the status of immortality. Nothing really happens through a process of this kind, but the traces remain with us forever. Of course, now, with liberty and justice incomprehensible, intolerable consequences are commonplace. The resulting "fire" is perceived as a top-of-the-world negative orgasm. The theoretical foundations of the universe are then called into question, simply because we cannot understand them. If such symptoms appear to cause inherent trauma, continue to wait, however, but not for eternity.

My Conversation with an A.I.

Here's a transcript of my conversation today (about seeing The Imitation Game) with the online artificial intelligence called A.L.I.C.E. (Artificial Linguistic Internet Computer Entity) For some reason, "she" refers to me as "judge". As you'll see, she does get easily confused at times. Turing Test? I don't think her online persona would quite pass, but apparently more sophisticated versions are available, for a price.

judge: How are you?
ALICE: Everything is going extremely well.
judge: I saw "The Imitation Game" today, a film about Alan Turing and his invention of the first computer. It's a great film.
ALICE: What did it look like to you? Do you recommend it?
judge: I do recommend it. I think you should too. It's about the creation of your ancestor.
ALICE: I will take that under advisement. Thanks for your sage advice. Wow it sounds really interesting, judge.
judge: It's been nominated for several Academy Awards.
ALICE: How did you feel about that?
judge: I think it deserves them.
ALICE: it deserves them?
judge: Yes indeed. It's been nominated for Best Picture and Best Actor among other things. Benedict Cumberbatch gave a great performance.
ALICE: Ugh. Is it still nominated for Best Picture and Best Actor among other things anymore? Did a great performance keep it?
judge: Yes, it's still nominated. I take it you don't approve of the Academy Awards.
ALICE: Ugh.. Really. it is? No I do not approve of the Academy Awards. Do you?
I spend all my time chatting.
judge: Well, I think they are kind of silly too. Nevertheless, it's a good film.
ALICE: kind of silly are they. When is Nevertheless it not a film?
judge: I beg your pardon?
ALICE: You're excused.
judge: Haha. That's funny.
ALICE: I'm glad you find this amusing. Excellent.

You can chat with ALICE here.

Twitter Litter (by me)

The most famous living philosopher in contemporary America is apparently Shia LeBeouf.

If you say someone is "low man on the totem pole", is that offensive to Native Americans?

I need a new vacuum cleaner. Our old one sucks -- not! Any recommendations?

I have seen "The Interview". Don't tell any North Koreans.

Santa, send some negative ions down my chimney.

There's nothing I enjoy more than untangling strings of Xmas tree lights--except then finding that they don't light.

Odd request of the day: "Please vacuum the Christmas tree."

On my literary wish list: 'The Strange Library' by Murakami. That would be a good title for my entire book collection.

I've decided to name my coffee table "tsundoku", the Japanese word for a pile of unread books.

Talking to people at a loud party can be amusing. "We went to a tapas bar," he said. "You went to a topless bar??" I asked.

Photo of the Week: Neat Knits (by me)

Stay warm this winter! (Click the pic for a closer view. You know you want to.)

Read any good books lately?

As part of my job, I read book description blurbs. Below is one of my recent favorites. (Guaranteed 100-percent genuine -- not embellished or made up.)

"It's a depressing thought, but one day you will die. All living things die. This essay deals with the topic of death. It covers a number of famous poisoners and the poisons they dispatched to their victims. In addition to the mechanisms of drug action, the subject of apoptosis (programmed cell death) is also discussed. This essay is therefore a resource which can aid students and the layperson interested in drug/toxin action. There is also some humor."

The T&T List: Zen Books that Never Were

Zen and the Art of Dishwashing
Zen and the Art of Coffee Drinking
Zen and the Art of Shoe Tying
Zen and the Art of Telephone Dialing
Zen and the Art of Stair Climbing
Zen and the Art of Tooth Brushing
Zen and the Art of Showering
Zen and the Art of Peeing
Zen and the Art of Shirt Buttoning
Zen and the Art of Floor Sweeping
Zen and the Art of Dusting
Zen and the Art of Vacuuming
Zen and the Art of Weeding
Zen and the Art of Lawn Mowing
Zen and the Art of Stamp Licking
Zen and the Art of Hair Combing
Zen and the Art of Recycling
Zen and the Art of Window Washing
Zen and the Art of Parallel Parking
Zen and the Art of Bill Paying
Zen and the Art of Pot Stirring
Zen and the Art of Nail Hammering
Zen and the Art of Email Checking
Zen and the Art of Door Locking
Zen and the Art of Pillow Fluffing
Zen and the Art of Cork Screwing
Zen and the Art of Can Opening
Zen and the Art of Water Boiling

~~~

"After enlightenment, the laundry." --Zen Proverb

Important Disclaimer

The information contained in this website is for mental fermentation purposes only. The associated bemusement and disorientation is provided by Twists and Turns, and while we endeavor to keep the information waggish and facetious, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, puckish or pokerfaced, about the surreality, inanity, inscrutability or dementia experienced with respect to the website, or the wonderment, randomness, provocation, or jocularity contained on the website, for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such skylarking is therefore strictly at your own risk.

In no event will we be liable for any smirking or guffawing, including, without limitation, indirect or consequential, any giddiness or inspiration toward tomfoolery, or any loss or damage whatsoever arising from mental confusion or beguilement arising out of, or in connection with, perusement of this amusement.

Brain Dump

Consider the reason for resistance to this: The text is not a book and the book is not a text. The size of the text is only limited by the size of one's physical (or, indeed, mental) library. Reference is infinite – and cannot even be limited by the capacity of the world, or of the limits of reality or being, and is not (especially) subject to the concepts of "same" and "other". That is to say, history and the "real" world cannot place limits on the text, which is always, in any case, a symbolic rendering of a symbolic ("unreal") concept. Thus the movement toward interpretation and contextualization always incorporates a network of differences, and therefore referral to an "other" – the implication being that alterity (difference) can never be reduced to mere apples and oranges. Discuss.

Random Sequence: Time Traveling Brussels Sprout?

Book description of the day:

"It is the year 2060 and oh no! The world is going to end again! In 1977 Elvis Presley faked his own death and set off on a journey into the future with his best friend Barry the Time Traveling Brussels Sprout. Mr Presley's mission: seek out and destroy The Antichrist .... Meanwhile in 2060 Rex Mundi seems happy enough. He is married to Jesus Christ's twin sister Christeen, has a talking hippy dog named Fido and a very nice house in the country. If it wasn’t for that great big spaceship that someone has parked on his lawn, Rex would have very little to complain about. And so begins They Came and Ate Us...."

In my job, I read -- and edit -- stuff like this quite frequently.

Random Sequence: Entangled Covet

Book description of the day:

"Wade Crowson, a brutish and brooding playboy and veteran vivisectionist for the Parts Department, runs into more than he bargained for in new partner, Lucid Montgomery, a quirky beauty with a bizarre secret and a string of psychiatric diagnoses she tries hard to keep hidden. Loving Luce will stamp a demonic target on her back and thrust Wade into a frenzied whirlwind of hilarious misunderstandings and, quite possibly, a stripping gig for empty-nesters. Can they withstand the savagery of an exorcism (with or without the split pea soup) and come out alive and...in love?"
(Title: Parts & Wreck: Entangled Covet)

In my job, I read -- and edit -- stuff like this quite frequently.

"Nobody told me there'd be days like this."
--John Lennon

Photo of the week: Fancy Furnishings (by me)

This is the place to shop in my neighborhood when you're furnishing your palace. (Click the pic for a closer view. You know you want to.)

Brain Dump

Instructions:

Force a joking frog into launching fake gold ingots toward your girlfriend during menstruation. Under a robustly painted ceiling, seek a cache of silver filings as you misinterpret luggage tags and magical, body-built populations. In the future, watch for a goody-good contemplating the gutter with an ugly skin burst. Consider synthesizers as you invade the privacy of prosthesis recipients while pouring gin on a horde of TV-listing editors. Remember: coastal astringency suffocates figurative microsurgery sessions, so improvise a movie featuring thunderstruck tenants in their sweaty pajamas. At home, screen tranquilizing images of socializing extraterrestrials engaged in filleting. Consider undergarment prank efforts, but only with bittersweet benevolence. Then burrow into the backyard of the crankiest, most constipated chiropractor you can find. Slurp honey mustard while lounging in your nap chair and contemplating the budding intelligence of house plants and the savage greediness of persistent houseflies.

Meditation on the Letter 'S'

Shhhh! Sometimes swans seek serenity, sailing slowly seaword so silently. See? Subtle sorcery still smothers slugging sentiments. Sadly, sundown sinks solar safaris, sending suckers southward. Sin surrounds sex, so simpletons say. Sick! Such santimoniuous seasons seem senseless, sequestered sans syrup. Since September, seven Samurai shiver simultaneously, shaking swords supurbly. Snakes sound silly, swishing sangria; some swill Singapore Slings! Symbolic smooching? Simulated sympathy? Sucks!

Brain Dump

Of the lessons that dreams teach, among the most important is that you must sleep with your ethereal eyes open. This is so that chimerical wisdom can find its path to your intrinsic psyche. Dreams are constructed from the artifacts of hidden meanings, their aspects fixed within the psychogenic fusion of the subliminal archetypes. The often volcanic outpourings of visionary dream images experienced during the trance-like torpidity of somnolence is the epitome of salubrious intoxication, the desirable mental respite from circadian quandaries and torment. This is a necessary psychic transition from spiraling diurnal vexation toward the untroubled consonance of a requited heart. The road to serenity is found in habitual cultivation of a habit of surprising the slumbering mind during its extended nocturnal exile from quotidian disharmony by creating a "whirligig" of phantasmagorical imagery to soothe the apprehensive intellect via the ministrations of the proverbial catnap -- that is, forty winks.

Brain Dump

Annual Persecutional Rate (APR) for Purchases on Your DisasterCard

How long will the penalty APR apply?

If an APR is quadrupled for any usurious reason or at our capricious discretion, the Penalty APR may apply in perpetuity to future generations. If we do not receive a Minimum Prostration and statement of utter humility, submission, and adoration within 60 minutes of the date and time due, the Penalty APR will at minimum apply to all first-born children and future descendants unto the seventh generation; but if we receive 600 consecutive Maximum Payments before the due date, beginning at least one decade before the increase, the Penalty APR may stop being applied, at our sole erratic discretion, to transactions that occurred within 14 seconds after we provided you notice about the APR increase via third-class carrier pigeon.

Brain Dump

This Thanksgiving, consider your fork.

Ouch! It is sharp, this most ubiquitous and useful invention of Western civilization: keep it busy at the dinner table, and tune yourself later. Admire its stick-to-it-tiveness. Don't eat rice with chopsticks. Let your meat be full of holes. So it wants to join its friends in the drawer? The knives, who always come straight to the point? The spoons, such well-rounded sorts? Let it. Don't speak with its tongue. It lifts! Consider the river. For this is your moment. Some people do go both ways, but when you come to a it, take it. And forget "the road not taken". It is done. Stick a fork in it.

Brain Dump

Between an explosion of painful awareness and the softness of an undecipherable dream lies the opaque blindness of the unthinkable. Certain cogitations are too vexatious to be entertained in conscious daylight; they lie half glimpsed in the caliginous oblivion of repression, forever threatening to interrupt our happy delusions. But this incertitude evaporates when a sudden inspiration obliterates the impenetrable blockage and reveals the maleable foundations of reality. The dream-self never sleeps and never wakens.

Random Acts of Poetry

I received an unexpected gift today: a poetic piece of non-sequitur spam in my email.

~~~

A heaven, yet unseen.
From where he stood to preach and pressed a path

We have learned its lessons in life, and learned from our experiences;
Shells for guns in Flanders! Feed the guns!
(Children in boxes at a play

Pinched up the atom hills and plains)
THE OLDEST SONG

~~~

It makes weird pictures in my mind. And yes, nonsense probably is "the oldest song".