Glasses Half Fooled

Okay, we'll admit that the cartoon above - while entirely accurate - was more or less thrown together under time pressure after we visited the eye doctor today (and wore the contraption shown above) because it had been a few years since we last updated our eyeglass prescription, and apparently we're supposed to be able to read actual words on street signs. Who knew?

Because we have a wretchedly expensive Obamacare policy which covers our non-existent ovaries but not our actual eyeballs, we went to the optometrist at Sam's Club (who is genuinely excellent) and got everything checked out for $60 cash. And we left with prescriptions for glasses (distance and reading) which we'll fill online at Zenni.com for about $25 a pair.  This is called "the free market."

Of course, the visit had its moments of drama. Our eyeballs were diagnosed with "map-dot fingerprint dystrophy," which sounds like we should get disability payments, handicapped parking, and perhaps be the subject of a tear-jerking TV movie.

Not that the Internet is going to help with any of that, what with them describing our heartrending affliction as one which "usually resolves completely with no loss of vision and in fact, many cases are not severe enough for the patient to recognize that there is something wrong. No treatment is typically necessary."

On the other hand, the doctor did casually mention that if we rub our peepers too hard when feeling sleepy, we could literally rip the skin off the front of our eyes, exposing raw nerves and causing excruciating pain. Which is why we'll be sleeping while wearing boxing gloves from now on.

Getting back to the mainstream media (if indeed we were ever there), the distortion and lies we're hearing about Trump just make it impossible to mount much of a cogent commentary here. We think Trump did fine on his overseas trip - and if Angela Merkel is huffily declaring that Germany and Europe may now need to show some self-sufficiency, we say "well done, Mr. President!"

We also thought he honored Memorial Day appropriately, which was a nice change from the previous 8 years. Seriously, we always felt that the hallowed grounds of Arlington Cemetery were defiled by Obama's presence.

And along those lines, here's a little something we posted on Facebook on Memorial Day...

Obama, of course, laid a wreath at the Bathroom of the Unknown Gender

On a final note (yeah, this is just a rambling day) let's take a look at what passes for cerebral comedy and incisive political discourse in the Leftist media...

Nice, huh? Alleged "comedian" Kathy Griffin (best known for being an angry, unfunny skag who has never even accidentally made an audience laugh) holding up Donald Trump's bloody, severed head. We're not sure what her message is, other than some sort of obscene endorsement of ISIS. 

Perhaps she should actually visit an ISIS training camp to entertain the troops, like some sort of Bizarro-world America-hating Bob Hope from Hell.

And if she does, we'd like to be there -  to sell throwing-rocks to the audience.

Memorial Day 2017

This cartoon from the late, great Glenn Foden perfectly sums up an important message: it's fine to celebrate, but we must never forget the real meaning of Memorial Day.  Every one of us owes a debt which can not be repaid, but can and must be honored throughout the entire year.

"Pick A Punchline" Friday

We're juggling a lot of household chores in preparation for some major renovations (which you'll hear about ad nauseam in the future) so decided to ignore what passes for news and just have a little TGIF fun today.

We can't say exactly why we like giving these Earwigs cartoons an old and rumpled look, other than it's fun to imagine them having been clipped from a really weird newspaper, perhaps on the same page as Ripley's Believe It Or Not. Which is also a story for another day...

On a different note entirely, this is Memorial Day weekend. Here's hoping that you fly your flag and enjoy getting together with family and friends for lawn games, hot dogs on the grill, a brewski or two, and a nice thick slice of Mom's apple pie.

And somewhere amidst the fun, be sure to take time to give thanks for those who sacrificed everything to give us the unimaginable freedoms and opportunities we enjoy every single day - even these days of apocalyptic, hair-on-fire hyperbole in the fake news media.

Especially make sure that any children (and at this point, we consider "children" to be anyone under 30) understands what this hallowed day is really about.

Have fun, stay safe, and watch out for those falling pianos!

Manchester Terror

It's happened again, as we all knew it would and, sadly, know it will again. A casual outing, a sudden explosion, and the death of innocents at the hands of a lunatic following an insane ideology.

ISIS is taking credit, which should certainly merit another "mother of all bombs" or even a low-yield nuke - whatever it takes to get their attention.

But as satisfying as that could be, it won't immediately stop the danger from "lone wolf" operatives. And indeed, there is no way to stop the danger - only to reduce it, and even that at great cost.

The Manchester killer was known as a radical to British police and was, apparently pointlessly, "on their radar." Which reflexively makes us wish that everyone on the radar was simply swept up and locked away. But is that really what we want?

Consider who was "on the radar" for terrorism under Barack Obama: "Right-wing extremists." A group defined by Homeland Security as people who were pro-life, opposed to illegal immigration, those who resist federal takeover of the states, and military veterans.  Odds are everyone reading these words would fall into one or more of those "extreme" categories.

We simply can't eliminate possible threats without the certainty of eliminating many of our protected freedoms. And the terrorists know it.

That being said, British authorities currently have a list of over 3500 "potential terrorists" including about 400 who left the UK to be trained by ISIS to fight in war zones like Syria and Iraq before returning to the UK. 

As counter-terror measures go, these people should be seen as low-hanging fruit: give them one week to get the hell out of the UK or lock them up. There are plenty of vacancies at Guantanamo.

Freedom-loving Western cultures can't erase every risk. But we can and must take greater preemptive actions than are currently in play.

BONUS: MOUTHING OFF

On a less somber day, we would have enjoyed roasting Monica "Wet Clean Up, Aisle 7" Lewinsky for her appalling editorial in the New York Times, celebrating the death of Fox News's Roger Ailes for allegedly exploiting her "personal tragedy." But we're not in the mood, so we'll cut straight to the chase.

Lewinsky was a lying, lascivious little slut back in the day, and she remains unapologetic for her role (and roll in the hay) in disrupting American government. If Bill Clinton, that miserable tower of human excrement, hadn't been busy fighting his removal from office, he might have actually been doing presidential things like, oh, nailing Osama bin Laden when he had multiple opportunities.

Would the World Trade Center towers have fallen if Bill Clinton's pants hadn't? We can't know, but we can say with certainty that it's at least possible that they wouldn't have. Which is why, Monica, this appalling story isn't really about you and never was. So do the decent thing, accept your shame, and - unlike your time spent kneeling on the Oval Office rug - shut your disgusting mouth.

BONUS TWO: SPEAKING OF ANNOYING WOMEN

Michelle Obana attempts a saucy, Jane Russell off-the-shoulder look...

Freudian Slippery Slope

So far, it seems that President Trump is doing a great job on his Middle East tour, striking deals on commerce and international security, as well as projecting an unapologetic aura of (trigger warning to snowflakes!) manliness that we haven't seen in the White House for a long time.

For instance, the Saudis invited Trump to participate in their traditional "sword bouncing" dance, an activity so hilariously phallic that it would make Anthony Weiner blush. This in marked contrast to Obama's first visit to the Middle East, during which he bowed before every turban-topped head and was then told to stand with the women while holding a cat in front of his private regions ("Trust us, it's traditional," the potentates giggled).

And there's a lot more testosterone in the President's statements overseas than we saw previously. Obama, as we painfully recall, basically declared that Islam created everything good about Western civilization, and that the evil, moronic, Bible-clutching simpletons of the United States of America then screwed it all up. And regarding terror, Obama basically stuck to the Reverend Jeremiah Wright's assessment that we were to blame for "America's chickens coming home to roost."

Trump is taking a different approach to terror, telling the Muslim world: "Religious leaders must make this absolutely clear: barbarism will deliver you no glory - piety to evil will bring you no dignity. If you choose the path of terror, you life will be empty, your life will be brief, and your soul will be condemned."

Admit it, you can't imagine those words coming out of Barry. While you don't have to imagine that he actually declared, following the terrorists' slaughter of our people in Benghazi, "the future must not belong to those who would slander the prophet of Islam."

There may be those who complain that there's too much of a men's locker room atmosphere surrounding Trump...but to us, it smells like fresh air.

AND FROM THE VAULT...

(Thursday, April 9, 2009) The White House now denies that Obama bowed down to the Saudi King, despite video and photos to the contrary. They say that "the president is taller than the King, so he had to bend to shake hands." Here's a hint, Mr. president - when they're looking down on the back of your head, you're bending over too far. And too willingly.

It looks like Obama was eager to blow...a diplomatic opportunity.

The Choir Infernal

Although it's a bit early in our day (barely) for mixed drinks, we can't help but indulge in mixed metaphors when trying to comprehend what's going on in the news. Per the cartoon, we can't quite decide whether the news broadcasts relating to the specious Trump/Russia investigation are coming from another planet, or whether the alleged journalists in the mainstream media have finally gone native, adorned themselves in grass skirts and war paint and, high on adrenalin and their own screaming chants, are now throwing spears at anything that moves.

Not since Michael Jackson set his noggin ablaze while shooting a Pepsi commercial have we seen so much "hair on fire" news. And we don't get it.

Did the Russians hack our election? No. Did they "influence" the result of our election? There's been no evidence of it. Did Trump conspire with Russia to make these non-events happen? Again, there's not a scintilla of evidence.  But you'd never know it from the rabid stories being reported virtually everywhere.

In some ways, we liken this phenomenon to the whole global warming sham - only now, instead of seeing "consensus science" we're seeing "consensus journalism" in which a story without substance or evidence is declared to be incontrovertibly true simply because so many nitwits have agreed to report it.

It's insanity, of course - and all the more frightening for that. We may be witnessing an attempted coup d'etat driven almost entirely by an overtly lying leftist media. And it's additionally worrisome to think about how the ever-volatile President Trump might react; after all, he's brought much of this situation upon himself (and us) with his Tourette's-like need to tweet every half-baked thought which ricochets through the caverns of his mind.

We'd say more, only we've managed to stall long enough that it IS time for a nice mixed drink. We're thinking cheap scotch mixed with an extra shot of our usual bile.

AND BECAUSE IT'S FRIDAY...

...we deserve a laugh, so here's another old cartoon by Stilton's father!

It's not parking as long as you keep the motor running. So to speak.

To Serve Americans

And some of us are ESPECIALLY good in taco bowls.

Mainstream media outlets are currently having screaming hissy fits over unsubstantiated reports that Donald Trump, noted lunatic, actually held a meeting with disgusting, potentially world-destroying Russian bastards and told them top secret anti-terror information which has only been widely reported in the world's newspapers since last March.

This action is apparently the opening of the seventh seal, and the immediate cue for impending Armageddon, impeachment, or yet another humorless SNL skit for Alec "Duck Lips" Baldwin.

Owing to the fact that we don't believe anything from the Left-leaning media these days, we find it very hard to get excited about all of this. However, in the interest of at least trying to understand the Liberals' mindset on all of this, we've invented a fun game - and you can play along!

From now on, when you hear a story about Trump and the Russians, substitute the word "Martians." And go ahead and imagine they're really bad ass Martians who want to eat our brains, defile our women, and get their own special restrooms. Now we can have all the terrifying fun the Lefties seem to be enjoying!

Although we shouldn't make light of this very, very serious situation. Is it possible that Trump is babbling state secrets in an irresponsible manner? Hell yes! But is it worse than the way Hillary protected state secrets? Not so much.

Of course, we should take seriously the threat from the actual Russians. It was they, after all, who grabbed the DNC emails and shared them with Wikileaks, causing Hillary to lose the election, right? I mean, even lacking any evidence that it happened, we all KNOW it's the truth because it's been reported so often. But...

Now there's a new wrinkle. It seems that rather than the big bad Russians, the DNC emails may actually have been sent to Wikileaks by a DNC staffer named Seth Rich who turned up mysteriously dead soon after the leaks were made public. Well, maybe not that mysteriously...

Dirty Hillary.

It seems fairly sure that Rich sent over 40,000 emails to Wikileaks - perhaps hoping to head off a presidency by a hopelessly corrupt Clinton crime syndicate. And according to a private investigator, police were told to "stand down" from investigating the murder (described as a "botched burglary" since the gunman had no interest in money or personal belongings).

Is the story true? We have no idea - but it has a LOT more credibility than the accusations being made against Trump. And certainly is more deserving of a special investigation than anything the President has been accused of doing.

It's Beginning To Look a Lot Like Crispness

It is an inescapable fact of life that as we age, the advertisers who have paid for our demographic information will do their best to advertise products which they feel will appeal to our age-appropriate needs and passions. Not to mention our declining ability to make good fiscal decisions.

Which is why those of us in the Jarlsberg household have grown used to getting mailers and phone calls offering us invitations to retirement/investment seminars, annuity offers, brochures for cruise vacations, great deals on "to your door" catheter deliveries, Social Security supplemental insurance, and seemingly benign catalogs offering everything from compression socks and elevated toilet seats to anaconda-sized vibrating ding-dongs, and high-power "personal" vacuum pumps which, if you're not feeling romantic, look perfectly capable of milking the cows in record time.

But with all that said, we hit a hilarious new low the other day when we received a big, cheery postcard letting us know that we could enjoy a FREE LUNCH AT RED LOBSTER just for sitting through a fun-filled seminar on getting cremated.

Yikes!

The mother and daughter on the invitation (shown above, though we added the flames) look like there couldn't possibly be a more enjoyable outing than enjoying some crab cakes and cheesy bisquits while hearing how long your body will have to roast over open flames in order for the bones to get crunchy enough for grinding, and what will happen to anything foreign which was still in your body, like fillings, a titanium hip joint, or perhaps an anaconda-sized vibrating ding-dong.

We can't really think of a topic which would make us less enthusiastic about visiting Red Lobster, though we have to admit that we're still considering attending just so that when the waiter comes for our order, we can say "I think I'll have the blackened..." (point at other guest) "that guy."

Not that we're against cremation. When the time comes, we're looking forward to that being our big, smudgy, final carbon footprint insult to Bill Nye, Al Gore, and Leonardo DeCaprio.

Plus, cremation can be a huge money-saver over traditional burial. For instance, our own parents had their "cremains" stored in a beautifully painted cookie tin which had been purchased at a garage sale only months before being pressed into service. "It will be handy for something," our father said presciently.

Similarly, we'd like our own ashes to be kept in an urn which is unpretentious, a bit fun, and (like us) extremely cheap. A quick look online turned up these potential receptacles, all of which have varying degrees of appeal...

Haunted house, Frog Prince, Cthulu, or KFC bucket? So many tough choices!

Alternately, if our family doesn't want us haunting our own home, they can cast the ashes into a few places we've suggested (including scenic vistas, the eyes of our enemies or, if subtlety is the goal, baked into brownies to be given as gifts).

In which case we'd still want an elegant and expensive-looking (albeit empty) urn bearing our name to be placed on the fireplace mantle and subsequently have it filled with hard pretzel chunks which could be casually munched for the sole purpose of freaking out sensitive guests.

We're not sure what laws apply to this sort of thing, which is why we're really looking forward to taking part in a robust question-and-answer session when we visit Red Lobster.

Federal Bureau of Incompetence

Few things fill our heart with joy as much as hearing the moist "Ker-SPLOOMF!" of exploding Liberal noggins - a sound we're hearing a lot of following President Trump's kinetic dismissal of former FBI Director James Comey.

Comey was, as you may recall, the Democrats' "Public Enemy Number One" for interfering in the coronation of the breathtakingly corrupt woman who (along with the DNC) rigged the primary process to steal the nomination from the lovable old socialist who was spanking her in contest after contest.

Which is why Democrats have been screaming for Comey's firing right up until the moment that Trump did fire him - at which point the Left suddenly decided that Comey was actually some kind of Jesus of Justice, and was being crucified for the sin of conducting an investigation into Trump's alleged ties to Russia ("Operation Snipe Hunt").

There are reports that Comey had recently requested more money for his Russian investigation, and the Lefties are citing this as not only the reason (and only reason) for his firing, but as proof of Trump's guilt. Because who, other than a guilty man, would discourage an investigation?!

An innocent man, that's who. An innocent man who already knows there's no substance to the allegations, and sees no reason in funding a years-long political sideshow designed only to impede his Presidency.

Whatever your political ideology, it should be easy to agree that James Comey was an unpredictable, unprofessional, self-involved train wreck who had destroyed the credibility of his office and agency. Everyone should be glad to see him gone.

And if the Left isn't glad, well, that's just a free bonus.

How the Left imagines Trump's dresser drawers.

Two Arms, Two Arms!

Okay, you know the drill by now: the news is predictably blah, we've got a tight schedule (for reasons too boring to enumerate),  and a dab too much stress. So we turn on our soothing recording of a vacuum cleaner and do an "Earwigs" cartoon to relax.

We'll also admit that this is sort of a trying week, emotionally. Father Jarlsberg passed away on the Cinco de Mayo, 11 years ago last week. And tomorrow is May 11 (which was a Mother's Day in 2010), and marks the last time we spoke to Mother Jarlsberg 7 years ago before her unexpected death.  So we have an unprintable suggestion for May and the dark horse it rode in on, and can use all the light levity we can muster.

And for no reason whatsoever other than to fill space and splash a little color on this page, here's an odd little bonus cartoon for you movie lovers...

There is NOTHING in the film to contradict this.

LATE-BREAKING BONUS: FIB DIRECTOR FIRED!

And yes, the spelling above was deliberate.

Fresh Earwigs

One of the primary differences between Hope n' Change Cartoons and Stilton's Place is that we no longer feel compelled to visit the subject of politics with every post - in part because we're not feeling the day to day assault from the Obama administration anymore, and not really looking to go out of our way to find fresh sources of stress.

Which is why you're getting a nice, fresh Earwigs cartoon today  - which hopefully gives you a fun start to your Monday, while freeing up our time to work on purging our home of superfluous bric-a-brac before starting some pretty major renovations soon. Not that we'll be doing the work, mind you. We'll just be signing the checks and weeping the bitter salt tears.

Part of the purge is finally converting about a cubic yard of old VHS videotapes to digital format. For those of us having sensitive dispositions, it can be a very emotional experience to see some of those decades-old images again. In part because they frequently leave me wondering "why the heck did I think I would want to ever see this again in my doddering old age?!"

But then something many years old will pop up, putting a smile on my face and making the whole process worthwhile.

I'm referring, of course, to a shot of scotch.

Pre-existing Political Conditions

So, why are there two cartoons today instead of just one? Because we're sick (not in the demented sense, which is sort of our day-to-day normal, but in the coughing, hacking, and spraying phlegm sense) and we honestly don't know if either cartoon will connect, so we thought we'd throw them both out there and hope for the best.

Personally, we have a fondness for the ducks (who haven't appeared here since 2013) and the solidly constructed comedic phrase "Aunt Edna's schnozz." But then again, we've coughed ourselves into a concussion and may be judgement impaired.

We don't have a lot to say about the passage of the GOP Health Insurance bill just yet, although we think that the DrudgeReport got waaaaaaaaaay ahead of themselves by declaring that this means Obamacare has been repealed. Not hardly, folks.

Moreover, we don't really have a firm grasp of what's contained in the House bill, and how much it might change in the Senate. We do know that the bill throws roughly $138 billion into helping make sure that people with pre-existing conditions can get insurance as the market "stabilizes."

Although to our ears, that simply sounds like propping up the system with taxpayer cash (unavoidable after Obamacare) until a future date - at which point people who have deliberately not insured themselves will finally and inevitably suffer the dire consequences of their poor decision making skills. Only we all know that will never happen.

In the classic sense, real "insurance" can't co-exist with a mandate to accept people with pre-existing conditions without charging them higher rates...at least, not in the long run. The GOP bill attempts to remedy this by re-establishing high risk pools which taxpayers will help fund - but in the end, the health insurance system will have to be either market driven or government driven, not both. We're hoping that yesterday's vote will be a step in the right direction.

And we'd say more, only now we're coughing flecks of lung tissue on our computer screen and having no real success wiping them off with the tiny (but numerous) wax paper wrappers from our extra-menthol cough drops.

Cough drops we damn well paid for ourselves.

No, the irony isn't lost on us.

UPDATE: PRE-EXISTING CONDITIONS

Hilariously, the Left is going insane on social media claiming that the new healthcare bill strikes down coverage of any pre-existing conditions (which it doesn't) and also defines "pre-existing conditions" to include things like rape, domestic violence, c-sections and more. Cher is even bitching that she won't be able to get her asthma medication anymore.

It's all lies, of course, and easy enough to check - although that's not as much fun as spewing outrage and virtue signaling on Twitter and Facebook. A friend who is an actual, certified expert in health insurance matters (you've likely seen him on TV) lays out these simple truths about the new plan:

Those who keep consistent coverage in place without any lapse in coverage will be able to move freely from one policy to the next and cannot be charged anymore for a preexisting condition. Those who REFUSE to keep consistent coverage in place and who as such attempt to 'game the system' by WAITING until they are SICK to buy health insurance (which drives up the costs for everyone else) will be penalized up to 30% more for health insurance. Those who are so sick that they are uninsurable (which is about 5% of the 23 million who buy individual health insurance) will be able to buy affordable health insurance coverage through state high risk health insurance pools. $128 billion was allocated to ensure that those people have affordable coverage when they buy health insurance in the state run high risk health insurance pools. This is the way it was done for 20 years before Obamacare as dictated in 1996 HIPAA law. The problem was there were about 5 states that did not follow that federal HIPPA law and did not have a functional high risk pool in their state. This law mandates that they not only have one but that it is well funded.

Stick It In Your (Good) Ear

Yes, that's an actual quote from Colbert.

We'd like to feign outrage at Stephen Colbert for his extended, gutter-language attack on President Trump on the CBS "Late Show," but frankly we've come to expect this bottom-scraping level of discourse from the Left.

More than anything else, this incident has given us a moment of nostalgia for the days when obscenity wasn't considered family entertainment. Specifically, we're remembering when Jack Paar, the wildly popular host of "The Tonight Show" at the time, actually lost his job after he dared to utter the words "water closet" (a gentle euphemism for "bathroom," as if one were needed) on his late night broadcast. How times have changed - and not for the better.

Mind you, when it comes to being garbage-mouthed, we can personally put Tourette's patients to shame. But we're not on a national stage, talking about the President of the United States. And in eight years of attacking Barack Obama, with cause, we never went quite as far as Colbert did. Except maybe that one Valentine's Day when we mentioned that Barry and his "body man," Reggie Love, could use Preperation-H to make their relationship even tighter.

Perhaps Colbert's screed can be attributed to the well-documented ratings war between himself and his late night rival Jimmy Fallon. The race for first place is thought to boil down to (and "I kid you not," as Paar used to say) which host can be the most vicious in his attacks on Trump. Or maybe the genuinely witty (but wildly liberal) Colbert has simply lost his mind after enduring 100 days of a President trying to make America great again.

We aren't going to boycott Colbert, because we already don't watch his show. But we hope he cleans up his act, and restricts his scatological outbursts to a more appropriate time and place.

We're thinking the water closet.

We have no idea, however, if he also has asymmetrical nuts.

BONUS: AND SPEAKING OF WATER CLOSETS...

In keeping with our reflection on the once-genteel nature of popular entertainment, we thought it would be fun to share a bit of movie trivia we recently discovered.

Back in 1960, Alfred Hitchcock's classic film"Psycho" was the first American movie (let alone TV show) to show a toilet being flushed. Audiences were shocked and horrified, even though the commode (oops, there goes our late night TV career) was only being used to dispose of torn scraps of paper.

Not even toilet paper. And definitely not used toilet paper. Which could probably get its own late night show these days.

The film that changed the whirl of motion pictures!

White House Correspondunce

Despite recent electoral upsets, when it comes to hypocrisy the Left still dominates the playing field. How else to explain the White House Correspondents Dinner, in which crude character assassination is passed off as "humor," in juxtaposition to the progressives' absolute apoplexy - and sporadic violence - directed against speakers like Milo, Charles Murray, or Ann Coulter?

President Trump wisely chose to break tradition (which is somewhat redundant, now that we think of it) and skip out on the media's self-congratulatory banquet. And by "self-congratulatory," we mean the kind of activity which usually results in needing glasses.

The evening was unsurprisingly filled with one-sidedly ugly remarks which can't remotely be described as jokes, including all those sentiments (sometimes cleaned up, sometimes not) shown in the cartoon above.

The event was emceed by alleged comedian Hasan Minhaj, who was particularly smug about being a Muslim - the first, we believe, to appear at the prestigious podium since Barack Obama. And we're not saying that his act was intended to bomb, but based on the material it seems likely that he was expecting to get 72 virgins out of the deal.

Indeed, the only genuinely funny thing at the banquet was Bob Woodward's assertion that there's no such thing as "fake news" being produced by the drunken luminaries in attendance. Now that's laughable.

BONUS: WE'LL DRINK TO THAT!

Daughter Jarlsberg would like to send sincere thanks to one and all for the many kind birthday wishes and nice remarks about her list of life lessons, and also share an insight behind her choice of Brahm's "Academic Festival Overture" as a personal theme song...

"There's a funny story behind Academic Festival Overture, which is part of why I love it so much. Essentially, the University of Breslau told Brahms that they were going to present him with an honorary degree. In return, they expected him to write them their own piece of music. Brahms thought that was pretty presumptuous of them, so to thumb his nose at them, the piece is actually a collection of student drinking songs. So much sass!"

Well played, Johannes, well played.