BLATHER REVIEW

And in other news...

I've decided to save my last Schiavo post for the day she dies. Other than that, I got nothin' right now. (Did I mention I was busy at work lately?)

Nothin' except fer a quicky crossword! :)

So, here's what t' do:

1) Draw a grid 11x11.

2) Fill in the spaces as follows (o=open. b=black):

row 1: 5o, 3b, 3o
row 2: 5o, 3b, 3b
row 3: 6o, 1b, 4o
row 4: 3o, 1b, 2o, 1b, 4o
row 5: 3b, 3o, 1b, 3o, 1b
row 6: 2b, 7o, 2b
row 7: 1b, 3o, 1b, 3o, 3b
row 8: 4o, 1b, 2o, 1b, 3o
row 9: 4o, 1b, 6o
row 10: 3o, 3b, 5o
row 11: 3o, 3b, 5o

3) Number the squares appropriately.

4) Solve the puzzle using the following clues! (I didn't try very hard to stump ya.... this time.)

ACROSS

1. Caesar, for one
6. ____ tung!
9. Ms. Oyl
10. Article, definitely
11. Surprising losses
13. Contemporary clone?
14. What you might do to a question
15. '82 flick
16. "Friggin' forever!"
17. Kiss noisemaker
18. 2nd amendment advocate
19. Some dinners
21. Green goal
22. Business disclaimer adjunct
23. Nothin' t'see here, mheh!
24. "...to negotiate ___ Paris" (Nixon quote)
25. Grant, for one
28. Sicilian ready to blow
29. Ship plate fasteners\
31. That girl
32. Posts for sails
33. Floyd's Syd (I know, I know, that was in the last puzzle, too...)
34 One who lives to live another's life (Chrike, I'm cynical sometimes...)

DOWN

1. Tomato, for one
2. Rover's cuisine, maybe
3. Thith ith an example
4. Street crosser, at times
5. Discover, for one's self
6. Where I'm not
7. Bone, for one
8. Egg warmers
12. Starry
13. Still The One group
17. Main artery
19. Gave a thumbs down to
20. Nissan model
21. To the core
23. Hermann, for one
25. For fear that
26. Sarge's dog
27. A @#$% memory, for most
30. Shop ___ (just tryin' to keep it clean! :P )

Solve away! Solve it...! /Homer

(btw, theres an 18x18 coming as soon as I work out all the clues. This one, I hope, will be a genuine challenge..)

Super Silly Crossword Puzzle Contest!

I sometimes make up crossword puzzles during my commutes to and from work. I never send them to anyone, though, so I'm sending this to you!

First one to send me the complete solution WINS!!!

What's the prize? Uh... I dunno yet. Maybe one of my old driver's licenses. Maybe a sense of satisfaction. We'll see!

Directions:

1) Draw a 9 x 9 grid.
2) Fill in the squares as follows:

row 1: 3 open, 3 black, 3 open
row 2: 3 open, 2 black, 4 open
row 3: 4 open, 1 black, 4 open
row 4: 1 black, 6 open, 2 black
row 5: 3 black, 3 open, 3 black
tow 6: 2 black, 6 open, 1 black
row 7: 4 open. 1 black, 4 open
row 8: 4 open, 2 black, 3 open
row 9: 3 open, 3 black, 3 open

3) Number the open squares appropriately
4) Do the puzzle!

(UPDATE: Thanks to Stephen Macklin we now have a grid!)

These are all common words. Many are common to crossword puzzles but I've attempted to make it a challenge which, believe you me, was a challenge. Good luck!

Clues:

ACROSS
1. Physical comity
4. "The Vatican ____"
7. Latin early bird
8. Pie-like
9. Especially
11. Letter from Lagos, often
12. Land
14. One PBS patron
15. Revue bit, maybe
18. Await the green light
20. Jovial grace
22. Complimentary
23. Wrath
24. Floyd's Barrett
25. Reach 2nd base

DOWN
1. A mo.
2. Finished
3. Truth alternative
4. Rather ribald
5. Secretary Hutchison
6. Class where you dress down
8. Type of tax or sale
10. Met counterpart
13. Jack's killer
15. Rosebud
16. Film taste
17. Fabled loser
18. Buts and ands cohort
19. Finish the dishes
21. Fish, for one

Lots of these are gimme's, so get crackin'!

Did You Know That....?

Boiling diced potato chunks in chicken broth, instead of water, for your mashed potatoes is a good idea. Yum!
Pan frying diced strip steak chunks in corn oil is a bad idea. A very very bad idea. Trust me. I tried it so you wont have to 'cuz:

NOW YOU KNOW....!

Did You Know That...?

The Russian word for "telephone" is "telefon". It's perfectly understandable that they'd just use the English word for Bell's invention.
The Russian word for "doctor" is "doktor". That's a troubling thought, and,

NOW YOU KNOW....!

Did you know that...?

Tomatos were discovered in South America and brought back to Europe. They were popular there for many years before they were introduced to North Americans. So, without tomatos or tomato-based sauces, what we think of as traditional Italian cooking didn't exist until after the discovery of America.

NOW YOU KNOW....!

When I Got Nothin', This Is my Go-To Meme

This is fun! (For me, anyway...)

1. Pick 13 movies that you enjoy.
2. Pick a line of dialog that you like.
3. As people guess the film, strike out that entry.
4. NO cheating!!! That means NO: Google, IMDb, etc.!

1: "If he was much of a friend he would have given you the directions himself."
2: "What does Johnny Rocco want? I know what Johnny Rocco wants. He wants more."
3: "Where's the rest a'me?!" [david]
4: "Don't look for it, Taylor. You may not like what you find." [Steven Macklin]
5: "I may go broke.... in 60 years!" [Victor
6: "All for one man.... Fubar." [Stephen Macklin]
7: "In the beginning it was great. We had fun. But then you started in on the clothes!"
8: "Not even if some fudgepacker you used to date has just been elected the first queer president of the United States, and he's invited you down to Camp David to celebrate, and you need someone to share the moment with. Not even then."
9: "Yes. Why is the top down? I'm fucking freezing."
10: "No. We've made too many retreats already. They invade our space.. and we fall back. They annex entire worlds.. and we fall back. Not this time. The line must be drawn... HERE! THIS far, No farther! And I-I-I-I-I will make them PAY for what they've done... [Squire Trelane]
11: "For some: their El Guapo is shyness. For others: it's a lack of education." [Bill]
12: "I think Jack's been pissing in my relief tube..." [Ted]
13: "Hey, I can walk you...!"

Even morer fun! (I hope)

Okay, so the quotes in the previous post were a bit obscure even though they (mostly) come from very popular movies. F'rinstance, "That's my boat" has probably been said in hundreds and hundreds of films, but the one I had in mind was Forrest Gump.

So, I'm gonna try again with some more unique dialogue. Some of these will be from the same movies as below, only they should be easier to recognize.

So, once again, here's the deal:

1. Pick 13 movies that you enjoy.
2. Pick a line of dialog that you like.
3. As people guess the film, strike out that entry.
4. NO cheating!!! That means NO: Google, IMDb, etc.!

#1: "I'm a zit. Get it?" [Trelane]
#2: "She was the only thing I ever loved, my Linda, and you killed her... you killed her... you killed her... you killed her... you killed her."
#3: "Hey, where are all the white women at?!" [Trelane]
#4: "It's only an island when you look at it from the water." [Stevie]
#5: "Until you told me that we weren't good enough, I thought high school was a blast." [Jody]
#6: "I'm your density." [David]
#7: "They say 'time is the fire in which we burn'." [Trelane]
#8: "Wait! Pull the string! Pull the string!"
#9: "No papers... state to state." [Trelane]
#10: "I had a dream that someone was playing with me gulliver."
#12: "Twelve cabins; twelve vacancies." [Ted]
#13: "'Transparent aluminum'?" [Trelane]

Come o-o-o-o-o-o-n!

Fun, Fun and more Fun

Yay! Found a cool meme at Jen's that she found at Jim's that he found at this place. (Sorry, Dairylander. Didn't catch yer name.)

1. Pick 13 movies that you enjoy.
2. Pick a line of dialog that you like.
3. As people guess the film, strike out that entry.
4. NO cheating!!! That means NO: Google, IMDb, etc.!

Most of my favorite movies are pretty well known. So I'll try to pick more obscure lines from them. See if you can get 'em all in one shot!

#1: "Once a place like this touches you, the wind never blows so cold again."
#2: "And you were a very apt pupil, weren't you?! You were a very apt pupil!"
#3: "This is not your bedroom."
#4: "That's my boat..."
#5: "Let's fold scarves!"
#6: "What is it?!" "A relic..."
#7: "Earth, Hitler, 1938..." [Squire Trelane]
#8: "Nothing. We're just talking."
#9: "I was gonna go 50/50 with a copper...!" (This is a gimme...)
#10: "Because men don't have them."
#11: "...they'll wish their fathers had never met their mothers..."
#12: "No. It is smaller than Earth, but 6,000 times it's mass!" [Ted...?]
#13: "That's not much of a compliment, either."

Fish in a barrel. C'mon!

Trivia Question

The first person to correctly answer this question wins.. um... a link!

Q: What is commonly sold at a price that cannot possibly be paid?

There is only one answer that I'll accept. Have fun!

UPDATE: JenLars has correctly answered the question!
The answer is: A gallon of gasoline.
If the thing costs $1.61 and 9/10ths, you can't give the clerk $1.62 and get 1/10th of a cent in change. Nope, y'can't buy a gallon of gas; the price doesn't exist.

Trivia Contest

The first to correctly answer this question wins a super-secret prize of no monetary value!

What makes the ink in a pen flow?

I, alone, will decide if your answer is correct enough to win. mwuhuhuhuhuh...

And no fair searching on the web!!!! Figure it out in you head, it's funner!UPDATE: Okay, I did some research, and the answer I had in mind turns out to be wrong. That settles it: Everything I was ever told by a high school teacher -- that was on a subject other than his/her specialty -- was bull.

The answer I had in mind was surface tension. Gravity couldn't be the answer since a ball-point can write upside-down, right?
Well, thanks to a post by Stevie, I took a trip over to bored.com and clicked on the HowStuffWorks link and read:

As the pen moves across the paper, the ball turns and gravity forces the ink down the reservoir and onto the ball, where it is transferred onto the paper.

and:

In the case of ballpoint pen ink, the ink is very thick and quick-drying. It is thick so that it doesn't spill out of the reservoir, but thin enough that it responds to gravity. That is why a normal ballpoint pen cannot write upside-down -- it needs gravity to pull the ink onto the ball.

What?! So I grabbed a pen and an envelope I have sitting here, held it above my head so I would be writing with the pen upside-down.
This is how far I got:

how long will this pen write upside-down before the ink

The next 2 1/2 words, "wont flow any--", fade very rapidly, and the final "--more" exists only as an inkless impression.

So Rachaeliscorrect