Automatic Ball Fetching Gadget called iFetch For People Who Have Dogs, Don't Deserve Them

Like most dogs,  my Jackson loves to interrupt us when he thinks we're getting too serious. He'll insist we play with him until we're all happy and tired.

Jackson's always right, of course. A play break at any time is a good mental health strategy. This is as it should be.

The iFetch, a device that throws balls for
dogs so you don't have to.  

Many times, the game involves fetching a toy, wrestling Jackson for the toy, chasing Jackson around to retrieve the toy. It can be exhausting, but it's always fun.  

Some people find all this play with dogs inconvenient or tiresome, however. For those people there's what I believe a new, disheartening gadget  for sale on line.

It's called iFetch, a device that throws a ball for a dog to play with so you don't have to. 

Of course, Fido must be trained to put the ball back in iFetch for it to be thrown again, but to me, that's the least of its problems.

The thing also looks a bit like a bizarre little toilet, but I'll let that little problem go, too.

Here's the issue: Why do you have a dog if you won't play with him or her? Granted nobody can always drop everything and devote every waking minute to keeping the dog happy and occupied. But jeez, taking five minutes out of your busy day now and again to engage the dog -- How hard is that?

Of course, I don't know what goes on inside the mind of a dog, but I'd bet my next paycheck that part of the appeal of playing for a dog is interacting with another being. That could be another dog, or a person.

I know my Jackson seems much happier when there are other dogs or people around. That seems true for most dogs. That's why so many of them get separation anxiety when left alone too much.

I'm sure many dogs would happily chase a ball thrown by a machine like iFetch.  But they'd be more happy if a person threw it.

Jackson the cocker spaniel playing
with a stick last winter. I don't know how
many times I threw that damn stick (happily)  for him

And doesn't throwing a ball for a dog to chase make people happy, too?  Many times, Jackson has "told" me I must play with him, now.

Sometimes, I don't feel like playing with him.  I'm in a bad mood. But I do it anyway, figuring it's not Jackson's fault that I'm in a crummy state of mind.

Within minutes, after Jackson has run around and I have too, I'm in a better mood. Jackson's a cheap psychotherapist, let me tell you. Instead of forking over big bucks to a psychiatrist, I just pay Jackson in dog good and doggy snacks.

Almost every dog is a good psychotherapist. So, while iFetch is a great idea, I don't know how far it will go. Just give us a battered old tennis ball, and humans like me will have the firepower to launch the ball and send our dogs gleefully running.

Devo Drummer Dies: Wearing A Flower Pot In His Honor

I just heard the news that Alan Myers, the drummer for that very unsual early 1980s band Devo recently died at the age of 58.

Devo is the band probably most famous for the song "Whip It,"

The band Devo recently lost their drummer to cancer.  

Devo was one of those bands that I loved back when I was in high school and college. They, like Talking Heads, Patti Smith and the B-52s, cast me as a bit of a weirdo when everybody except me was listening to Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and, if you were a teeny bopper, Bay City Rollers or something like that.

I just loved Devo's eccentricity. As you can see in the video below, they appear to be wearing flower pots as hats. That was a bit of a trademark for them.

Even when they did a remake, you knew they'd make it their own. Just check out Devo's version of the Rolling Stone's "Can't Get No Satisfaction" if you want proof.

I looked up the Whip It video and it's insane, of course. Which means I love it. It hasn't gotten old with age.

Especially nice, and a good tribute to Myers, comes at the very end of the "Whip It" video. The mom in the video weighs on his antics:  "Oh, that Alan!"

Here's that Whip It video. It will brighten your day:

 

Scenes From A Vermont Flood

For more than a month now, torrents of rain have been pouring onto Vermont. There's been repeated, damaging floods.

The storm clouds roll in at around 1 p.m. on
the Fourth of July

Even those that have not experienced any flood damage are suffering. Crops are drowning. Mosquitoes are thriving. People are sick of being wet.

On the Fourth of July, one of the worst storms yet in this episode of rainy weather swept into northern Vermont, and we had another, yes, another flash flood. It's getting old. The photos in this post are scenes from this Vermont flood.

The heavy rain quickly overwhelms roads, in this case, i
in Jericho, Vermont.  

 This four foot deep swimming
pool in Richmond, Vermont
was overwhelmed by
flooding.

Residents of Jericho try to
control the effects of flowing
water and mudslides  

This road in Jericho is closed for
a long time.

After doing their damage, the
thunderstorms depart, glowing in
the Fourth of July sunset.  

Maybe He Should Have Tried Death Metal: World's Angriest Guitar Player

A recently found a video that's been circulating around the web for a year now, but it's worth bringing up.

It's billed as "The Angriest Guitar Player Ever" and I cannot dispute that. No, not at all.

A screen capture from Angriest Guitar Player video.  

It's a guy named the Treeman, from Liverpool, England, trying to learn the chords of a new song and not succeeding.

It would have made sense for him to step back and wait until he calmed down before resuming, but again, that would have made sense. And made for a boring video. So we get to see a hell of a temper tantrum.

On the one hand, it is fun to watch a person go into full on melt down. But it is a little mean, I admit, spreading the guy's bad moment for all the world to see. So it is with mixed emotions that I present him. Though he did seem to allow the video to get on YouTube.

The video is a hilarious instruction of how ridiculous we look when we are angry and frustrated. Warning, language is NSFW and not good for super sensitive ears:

Bad Idea Of The Week: Pork Laced Bullets To Send Muslims To Hell. Or Something

This has to be one of the ugliest and stupidest things I've read in a long time.

An ammunition manufacturer is selling pork laced bullets. 

Why, you ask? Well, you can shoot Muslims with them, and the contact with pork will make them go straight to hell, according to this deeply offensive company.

According to the company, the ammo is a "peaceful and natural deterrent to radical Islam."

The incredibly offensive pork bullets  

I'm not sure how shooting somebody with a bullet, pork laced or not, is "peaceful and natural," but what do I know?

All this is pretty offensive, as you've already figured out, but just for the record, here's their advertising spiel:

"With Jihawg Ammo, ou don't just kill an Islamist terrorist, you also send him to hell. That should give would0-be martyrs something to think about before they launch an attack. If it ever becomes necessary to defend yourself and those around you our ammo works on two levels."

A lot has been written on what a completely odious thing these bullets are, so I'll let that go. I'll just ridicule the bullet maker instead, since they don't seem to command our respect.

But I have some practical questions about this.

Suppose you somehow need these bullets in a hurry because you suspect some  marauding Muslims in your neighborhood (Never mind most Muslims don't "maraud" and are certainly unlikely to do so in your neighborhood)

By the time you get your bullets in your gun, it'll probably be too late to do anything about it. Unless you always keep pork-laced bullets in your firearm, which is another issue.

Also, you should always keep your guns and ammunition locked in a safe place, but the pork bullets add another dimension. I imagine dogs and other animals trying to get at them for a taste. Wouldn't that be dangerous, if Fido literally bites the bullet?

Also, I have almost no expertise on all things Muslim, but yeah, maybe they're not allowed to voluntarily consume pork. But if they are somehow injected with pork against their will, via bullet or otherwise, it's not their fault. Wouldn't they be given a pass by Allah or something?

Somebody smarter than me has to tell me what the score is there.

Messes: Worst Jackson Pollock Moment EVER. And The Attack Of The Killer Suds

I hate dropping crumbs, spilling my drink or tracking mud into the house. I'm a messy guy.

But I can console myself in realizing I could have made bigger messes than the usual trail of sloppiness I leave behind me.

The aftermath of a crash involving lots and lots
of spilled paint. Photo from KOMO. Click
on the photo for a better view.

I've got two good examples.

The first is a car crash. Car crashes almost always make messes, what with the twisted metal, broken glass, pieces of plastic that fall of the car.

It makes an even bigger mess, as someone in Belfair, Washington State found out recently, when you're hauling a whole bunch of paint cans in your car and you accidentally drive off the road, according to television station KOMO. 

KOKO reports the driver had minor injuries. And lots of paint. His equally paint soaked dog was in the car with him. The pooch wasn't hurt, and neighbors brought the dog to their house for a very good hosing off.

I think if I ever need paint, I'll have it delivered to my house, thank you. But the wreckage of the car could become sort of a Jackson Pollock type work of art, don't you think?

The second messy incident happened in Tokyo, and made a neighborhood look like it had just been hit by a big snowstorm. Which is odd for this time of year in notoriously hot, humid Tokyo.

It seems someone threw 40 liters of soap down a drain on the thirteenth floor of an office tower. The soap gurgled its way down to the street level sewer, got agitated so more and became so aerated there was an eruption of dense soap bubbles that had to be shoveled out of the way.

I've seen snowbanks along city sidewalks, but sudsbanks?  Watch the video to see what I mean:

Watch Disabled Military Veteran Lawmaker DESTROY Military Disability Cheater

In a You Get 'Em video that I found totally stirring, there's a story and video circulating of U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth, D-Illinois, encountering a guy she's none too happy with during a recent Congressional hearing.

Duckworth, a veteran who suffered disabling injuries in Iraq, was participating in hearings on veterans benefits scams and abuses, was questioning Brulio Castillo, a government contractor who is accused of seeking contracts by playing up his military-related disabilities.

U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth, D-Illinois, ripped
apart an allegedly scammy government
contractor in a video that is a sight to behold  

He hurt his foot playing football for a military prep school while a teenager, according to reports.

To gain favor for a government contract,  Castillo is said to have written this about his injuries

"These are the crosses that I bear due to my service to our great country and I would do it again to protect this great country."

Duckworth wasn't buying it.

From Gawker:

"I'm so glad you would be willing to ply football in prep school again to protect this great country," Duckworth responded. "Shame on you, Mr. Castillo. Shame on you. You may not have broken any laws...but you certainly broke the trust of this great nation. You broke the trust of veterans.

Iraq and Afghanistan veterans right now are waiting an average of 237 days for an initial disability rating. It is because of people like you are who are gaming the system are adding to that backlog that young men and women who are suffering from post-traumatic stress, who are missing limbs, cannot get the compensation and the help that they need."

It is so great seeing someone totally destroy a probably scammer like this.

As Gawker notes, you have to watch the whole video of Duckworth dismantling this guy. It is a work of art. Watch: