Build Date: Wed Sep 30 18:50:35 2026 UTC
The 9/16 wrench: simple in form, near universal in function, and missingfrom every goddamn toolbox I've ever owned, borrowed or stolen.
-- gomonk
Hallmark's Demented Tax Postcards
2000-04-12 12:45:47
As civilization atrophies, insanity grips even the bastion of saccharine consumer greeting cards. The fear and paranoia that greets tax day shifts the zeitgeist into a dark, destructive funk. And instinctively, on some deep, primal level, Hallmark begins reflecting the mounting despair with a series of web postcards catering to the cathartic release that can only come from seeing shit fucked up.
Rebellion slices through the Hallmark animation department, where a popular mandate for tax revolt allows the animators to shuck off their former restraints. Death appears over a blood-red sky in an eerie goth cartoon with strange homosexual overtones. In "The Adventures of IRS Man," Hallmark's animators deconstruct the fascist overtones in Superman through a sardonic warning parable that concludes "Happy Tax Day, Citizen."
Foreshadowing the pagan roots of Easter, naked IRS workers cavort and prance lasciviously in "Filing Can Be Fun," and a kinky submissive offering appears to pander to some kind of toilet fetish. The unmistakeable urban funk behind "Need some deductions" belies its innocent surface veneer as it careens recklessly to a hostile and shocking conclusion. And the MIDI hip-hop continues with "File the Easy Way" -- one of two reactionary stories which nihlistically counter the cozy technocentric wisdom of online tax returns. This theme is amplified in a scary -- yet bad -- cartoon with a cat illustrating "The perils of filing your taxes electronically."
Hallmark's subversive artwork apparently raised the hackles of "The Man." Unseen forces at the site have buried the web pages beneath a maze of un-linkable sub-directories, and all visitors to Hallmark.com now get tagged with a "Session ID," presumably to allow government investigators to track their motions through the site for later investigation. But don't let that scare you off! Locate the "Tax Day E-Cards" section in the pull-down menu -- and prepare for a mind-expanding experience. Hallmark's slogan was once derided as "When you care enough to send the very stupidest." Now they're breaking out of the mold, reaching out to a hip alternative generation. Pump it up, Hallmark. And keep on keepin' it real....
T O P S T O R I E S
John Dvorak has passed. I’m of mixed emotions. First off I’m more positive about his contribution to the overall technology journalism of the early PC days through the 90s, despite how many things he got wrong. He was a firebrand and commanded attention. (More...)
America's National Recording Registry Inducts Culturally Significant Artist - Weezer!
America's Library of Congress calls them "defining sounds of history and culture" and "audio treasures worthy of preservation for all time based on their cultural, historical or aesthetic importance in the nation’s recorded sound heritage." Ladies and gentlemen, I give you... Weezer! (More...)
The Crossroads are real and The Blues is a place; The enduring myth of Robert Johnson (More...)
California Glory Hole attracts huge crowds
A glory hole at Napa's Lake Berryessa is drawing huge crowds. According to Chris Lee, the general manager for the Solano County Water Agency, the glory hole hasn't been active since 2019, and only restarted operations on Feb 4. (More...)
Republican State Senator busted after soliciting a teenage girl
Republican State Senator Justin Eichorn of Minnesota was arrested for soliciting a teen girl on Monday just hours after he introduced a bill proposing "Trump derangement syndrome" (TDS) as a form of mental illness. (More...)
Parents claim measles is not that bad after having only one child die
The parents of a Texas girl who died from the measles are defending their decision not to vaccinate their daughter. "She says they would still say 'Don't do the shots,'" an unidentified translator for the parents said. "They think it’s not as bad as the media is making it out to be." (More...)
C L A S S I C P I G D O G
Suru and I were at the local supermarket recently when we found ourselves in the booze isle, surrounded by rum. Banana rum, coconut rum, vanilla rum, unfiltered run, Jamaican rum, rum, rum, and more rum. We bought one of each and started experimenting... (More...)
I just came across this coolio essay by Pigdog Journal Science Editor binky wedged between two staves in the back corner of the submissions barrel. It's on the origin of the cyberbilly and is definitely de rigeur for any serious student of this fascinating sociological movement. (More...)
Poor Metallica. All they want is to continue to put out the same weak "Heavy Metal" they've been churning out since the "And Justice For All" days? and make gooey wads of cash in the process. The problem is, people aren't buying their bound for the heavy metal scrap heap, over-produced, uninspired, tired crap. And let's face it, their various commercial endorsements won't pay for the lifestyle they've become comfortably accustomed to. Resorting to lawsuits makes perfect sense, when you need spending money. But just one lawsuit isn't going to pay their bills. So, to aid Metallica, I've composed an open letter to the boys in the band, with suggestions as to whom else they might sic their lapdog lawyers on... (More...)
Patient Joab's scientifick editorial discusses aspect of the space-time-beer continuum never before processed by sub-bush-robot minds!!! Too fabulantastic to contempulate! (More...)
Extreme pimpin' under pressure ... how to tell a playa from a sucka ... keeping your hoes under control ... tips for mackin' success from Pigdog's own Terrordrone. (More...)
A Day in the Life of a Beverotologist
It was starting to look like a very boring Saturday, trapped as I was in the suburban wastelands of the outer Bay Area, so I called my Able Assistant (AA) and proposed that we perform some Spocktail field tests. For some time I've been working on creating the quintessential cinematic beverage and even tho' SMRL does most of its testing during nocturnal hours, this seemed an opportune time to roll up the sleeves of our labcoats and get some science done. While the beverotology creation tested this day (The Neurotoxin) must be deemed a success, this article focuses more the journey of the experimenters, rather then the science of beverotology. (More...)
