Tim Torkildson's Clown Alley

Friday, November 30, 2018

Postcards 7

Hackers, Schmackers; it's old news nowadays -- How to Write a Bestseller -- Federal Employees can be Seen but Not Heard

LONDON — The Marriott International hotel chain said on Friday that the database of its Starwood reservation system had been hacked and the personal details of 500 million guests going as far back as 2014 were compromised. NYT

Another hacking outrage, and it barely rates a yawn.

These accounts seem stagnant and are badly overdrawn.

The world now, as we know it, extracts data like a tooth;

For good or bad, like Judgement Day, we give up all our truth.

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Book sales boom in December, and in the lean months following the holiday peak, even modest sales can catapult a book onto the best-seller list. WSJ

Bestsellers are written by hacks

who profit from book selling slacks.

In midwinter they

will publish away --

and readers will buy 'em in stacks.

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In a move that some ethics advocates say could be an opening to limit dissent, the federal government has issued new guidance for the political activity of federal government workers, warning that weighing in on impeachment or talking about “the Resistance” may constitute prohibited activity.

Washington Post

There once was a government clerk

who said that he thought Trump a jerk.

Tossed out on his ear,

he cried "I do fear

I never again will find work!"

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Thursday, November 29, 2018

haiku

Postcards 6

Reporter Nicholas St. Fleur Invents Time Travel Machine

Nicholas St. Fleur, of the New York Times

Those in the know say it was only a matter of time (excuse the pun) before the U of C at Santa Cruz graduate Nicholas St. Fleur perfected time travel.

Emily Kaugummi, the Director of Extraneous Affairs at the Willard Scott Institute for Something like Science, says: "Mr. St. Fleur combines the intuitive brilliance of Einstein with the mettle of Tesla -- and he also does a mean SpongeBob Squarepants imitation."

St. Fleur first considered the intricate challenge of time travel when he was appointed to the Trilobites desk at the New York Times three years ago. Looking at all those old fossils made him think -- made him think they should get some younger editors around the place. It also made him think how cool it would be to go back in time to see a real dinosaur, an authentic Bubonic Plague victim, or an original Swanson's TV Dinner. As he explained to M.I.T. students last year: "I took the multi-dimensional theorems of Rutherford and combined them with the quantum mechanics of Niels Bohr to come up with the equation BVD = PDQ x 2. From there all I had to do was contact Steven Spielberg for the financing, and the machine practically built itself."

Mr. St. Fleur says he has already used his time travel mechanism to go back and warn Julius Caesar of the dagger attack in the Roman Senate, and help Thomas Edison invent the Nerf Ball before beginning on the electric light.

While he is reticent about future time travel voyages, he has thrown out hints that something should be done about the price of Starbucks' Frappuccino.

His other interests include rehydrating snow globes, brewing his own dishwater, and eradication of the gingersnap.

He was recently awarded a Best Mixologist certificate from the Elkhart Distillers Association.

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