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March 7, 2002Colors You'll Never SeeI've been shopping for new paint recently. Paint makers never just call paint "blue" or "light green" or "kind of orange-ish-yellow-ish." Instead, they name their paints things that are supposed to evoke deeper thoughts and emotions. I settled on "popcorn" in my bedroom and "desert haze" for my bathroom. I poured over hundreds of paint chip samples before I came to this decision. I'm not sure who they are hiring to name these colors, but whoever it is, they must do a lot of drugs because many of the color names make little or no sense to my non-LSD-influenced mind. I found colors like "bounding main," and "briny deep." There is "nostalgic tale," which could be just about anything depending on what the story is about. (It happens to be light tan.) I also found "cherish," "bison," "cozy melon," and "hemlock." Yes, hemlock. That's what I want on my walls: the color of poison. I found another color I really liked, but I ruled it out when I saw its name. "Tobacco road," it was called. What troubles me about this is that freelance writers other than myself are probably getting paid good money to come up with these names. Here my own list of paint color names you will most likely never see:
March 14, 2002Breaking Up is Hard to DoFor a long time, I thought nothing in life was more irritating than radio commercials for cell phones. But I have found something more irritating: Cell phone customer service representatives. My personal vendetta is against Sprint PCS. It began the time I had to wait on hold for 45 minutes before a live human being would talk to me. When someone did finally answer, she accidentally cut me off. Oops. They had billed me double what I was supposed to pay. It was simple math, but it took a 20 minute argument before the highly trained billing lady could grasp the fact that 35 dollars does not equal 70 dollars. Sprint PCs has a shrewd business strategy: Sign people up and then make it virtually impossible to leave. They are like a psychotic, jilted lover who will not let you break up with them. I called Sprint this afternoon to end our relationship. First I waited on hold for 10 minutes. "I'd like to cancel my account," I said when someone finally answered. "Okay. I'm going to let you talk to someone in our retention department." "But I don't want to be retained. I just want to...." It was too late. I was on hold again. Five minutes later, the retention department answered. "Is there anything at all we can offer you to keep you as a customer?" the retentive lady asked me with an almost sincere whine. I bit my tongue as I pondered the possibilities. "For just five dollars more per month we can offer you double the minutes you have right now." Ooh! Pay more money! Get more bad service! "Look," I said, "I know this is hard for you, but this just isn't working. I need a cell phone provider I can rely on. Someone who will be there for me when I need them. You always put me on hold. I feel neglected. Do you have another customer?" "No!" she said. "I swear you are the only customer for us!" "Well," I squirmed, "I just can't go on in this relationship. All the waiting on hold, the dropped calls, the billing errors. It's like you don't even care." "But Dave, we do care! We do! How can we prove it to you?" "It's too late for that," I sighed. "Fine!" The retentive lady sputtered. "We'll terminate your service at the end of your billing cycle!" The end of my billing cycle? That's three weeks away. I hung up feeling lonely, disconnected, knowing I would not feel the closure I so badly need until my billing cycle finishes.
March 18, 2002A Green Light for TerroristsThe US government announced a new color-coded alert system for terrorist activity last week. The system was designed to help six-year-olds better understand how paranoid they need to be. Under the new five-color system, terrorists will be kept informed as to whether or not the government knows they're out there. The White House issued this key to understanding the new system:
Director of Homeland Security Tom Ridge announced at a press conference that the White House is inviting all Americans to comment on the system for a period of 45 days. Responding to Ridge's invitation, Jenny Brown, a first-grader at Peoria Elementary School, said, "I think it's pretty."
March 24, 2002The Artic FoxNature lovers have been flocking to davethefox.com in search of information on the elusive "artic fox." Over the past year, this website has had approximately one hit per week from people looking for information on artic foxes. Google and other search engines have been bringing artic fox activists to a page on this website containing the words, "Articles by Dave Fox." Unfortunately, this page contains absolutely no information whatsoever about artic foxes. Furthermore, there seems to be a dearth of information throughout cyberspace about this mysterious animal. As a public service to people prowling the Internet for information about the artic fox, davethefox.com is proud to provide this information: The artic fox (vulpus illiteratus) is an unusually slow fox that tends to lag behind the rest of the den. These foxes are easily disoriented when trying to locate the arctic. In order to survive, they generally need special remedial attention from their mothers. Very little information has been published about the artic fox. The leading world expert on artic foxes, Mortimer Schpugenfelster, is a reclusive man. Much of his research on the artic fox is illegible. He has written, however, "The artic fox could of come from the north one time, but wierd circemstances made him get realy disorientated." The artic fox became a source of worldwide controversy during the 1996 International Spelling Bee, when the parents of one contestant disputed the existence of the artic fox. Unable to locate the artic fox in the dictionary, judges were forced to declare the spelling bee invalid and begin again, just as they were about to award the prize to 14-year-old Jim Bob LeFonque. Jim Bob's father, Beauregard DuFonque, protested the decision. "I don't care if my boy Jimmy Bob is a D-student," Mr. DuFonque said. "You don't need to be gettin' C's to spell artic!"
March 24, 2002The Asnem AwardDavethefox.com is excited to unveil the brand new Asnem Award. "Asnem" is "Mensa" spelled backward, and is awarded to people in our society with impressively low IQs. And this week's winner is... Curtis Anthony Sherman, age 35. Sherman handed a bank teller a note at a Wells Fargo Bank in Everett, Washington, recently, demanding that he be given $10,000 in cash. Unfortunately, Mr. Sherman did not notice there was a Post-It note stuck to the back of his hold-up request. The yellow sticky note had his girlfriend's phone number written on it. Oops. Police called Sherman's girlfriend, who turned him in. Congratulations, Mr. Sherman, for winning the Asnem Award. You have just won an all-expense-paid 13-year vacation in the Snohomish County Prison. [Send your nominees for Asnem Awards to dave@davethefox.com.]
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