Getting Into The Weeds

Some people may wonder, "what is the deeper meaning of Earwigs?"

Simply put, the deeper meaning is that we don't want to just post a picture of an "Out to Lunch" sign when the news muse has forsaken us. After all, people make a significant effort to visit this site, frequently wearing their Sunday best and giving extra attention to their personal hygiene. And so we just wouldn't feel right about giving you nothing but an IOU (unlike the government types who have emptied our entitlement "lockboxes" and filled them with chits. Mostly of the bull and horse variety).

Earwigs began many years ago (predating Hope n' Change, Johnny Optimism, or our awareness that "blogs" would someday be a thing) when we acquired access to a motherlode of antiquated clip art on one of those new-fangled shiny CD things and decided to use some of the images as writing prompts.

The process was to select a not-overtly-funny piece of art (we like a challenge) and then try to generate as many punchlines as possible in order to stretch our creative muscles.

But apart from that pragmatic exercise, this is still what passes for fun in our head. We get a happy little shot of dopamine every time an unexpected punchline suddenly pops into existence (we don't write them so much as wait for them). We're hooked on absurdity, and there's no 12-step program.

Although if there were, the steps would probably look a lot like this:

Forced March Madness

For those who may not be up to date on the most au courant Hallmark holidays, Wednesday was "National School Walkout Day" - during which students in some school systems were actually compelled to protest, whether they wanted to or not, under the guise of "showing support" for the 17 victims of the nightmarish shooting at Florida's Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Frankly, "showing support" for the victims isn't exactly an act of radical courage - everyone mourns these innocent victims, including the President and every member of the NRA. And yes, everyone would like to assure student safety. So the point of the walkout isn't really to support anyone - but rather to flat out protest against the Constitution in general and the Second Amendment in particular. An amendment which, we'd guess, is not being constructively explained in schools which are preoccupied with lockstep liberalism.

Happily, many school districts threatened consequences for students who went AWOL during class time - but not all of them. Take Rocklin High School in (surprise!) California, where a history teacher, Julianne Benzel, dared to ask her students if it would be equally appropriate for the school administration to support a walkout to protest abortion. Mind you, she didn't discourage her students from participating in the walkout...but she did ask them to actually think.

She was subsequently put on paid suspension because of "several complaints from parents and students involving the teacher's communications regarding the student-led civic engagement activities," which is as ripe a piece of euphemistic liberal baloney as we've heard in a long time.

We'd suggest that in the future, such schools might actually encourage the teaching of history rather than assuring that uneducated students will be doomed to repeat it.

BONUS: THE WEARING OF THE GRIN

Technically, that's a tease-shirt

Everyone claims to be Irish on St. Patrick's Day, but we're the real deal - having the blood of a County Cork grandfather coursing through our veins. Albeit not coursing through the official family tree: it seems that grandad "Red," a piano teacher and smooth talker, hit the road immediately after discovering his young piano student (who apparently also got organ lessons) was "heavy with child."

The young girl was quickly transported to another town to secretly give birth (as was the custom back then) and the baby boy was eventually adopted as an "orphan" by her own parents...and raised as her brother with no one the wiser.

That boy became our father - and a great one! And whenever St. Patrick's Day rolls around, we find ourselves thankful that abortion wasn't as easy to obtain all those years ago...because otherwise we wouldn't be here to heft a mug of green beer in honor of our immediate ancestors (be they scoundrels or not).

Best wishes to all for St. Patrick's Day, and here's hoping that if a leprechaun does gift you with a pot of gold, the IRS never finds out about it!

Un-sacred Cow

Okay, this won't go down in the annals of Stilton's Place as our wittiest punchline - but it's the best we could do without actually invoking language which would make a Tourette's patient blush or get us a visit from the Secret Service.

Because we didn't make up the horrible, anti-American crap Hillary is spewing in the panels above. In India to promote her book "What Happened," Russia's favorite uranium saleswoman launched into this tirade to describe the millions of troglodytes who voted for Trump as hateful, misogynistic racists who would actually have to improve to be Deplorables.

If this horrible woman had won the presidency, it seems very likely that every person who visits Stilton's Place would now be in either an internment camp (the lucky ones) or a cemetery (those who committed Arkancide). Because to paraphrase Sally Field, she "really, really hates us."

And frankly, Hillary, the feeling is mutual.

BONUS: STAIRWAY TO LEAVENWORTH

Fortunately, the Secret Cervix was on the scene.

While in India, an allegedly sober Hillary Clinton took roughly her millionth spill while trying to stumble down a simple flight of steps.

Despite her painful, legs-akimbo, "the baby is coming NOW!" position, medical experts have confidence that her vagina will be completely recovered should it decide to run for office again in 2020.

False Idle

Reaffirming what we already knew about the mainstream media's fawning worship of all things Obama, former New York Times editor Jill Abramson has revealed that she keeps a Barack Obama doll in her purse to handle during times of stress.

"Some people find this strange," Abramson admitted in a rare moment of mental clarity, "but you have to take comfort where you find it in Donald Trump's America."

In other words, not from reduced taxes, business and consumer optimism, and astounding job growth.

KIM CHEESE

Donald Trump left pretty much everyone dumbstruck last week when he agreed to meet with North Korea's leader, Kim Jung Un, to discuss the possible denuclearization of the nasty little dictatorship.  This was especially surprising considering Trump's strong posture in the face of the rogue nation, and his calling Kim Jung Un every insulting playground nickname in the book.

Hilariously, serial liar and Obama insider (but we repeat ourselves) Susan Rice immediately came forward to suggest that, prior to the meeting, Trump avail himself of the "expertise" which informed the Obama administration.

You know, the expertise that went into Obama's feckless (and fecked up) policy of watching North Korea build increasingly powerful nukes, and ignoring the tiny nation's provocative tests of larger and larger missiles (including one shot in the direction of Hawaii on the 4th of July).

Here at Stilton's Place, we hope that Trump's meeting with Kim will be a complete success, and make the world a little safer.

We also hope that Trump will poke a finger into Kim's tummy to see if he laughs like the Pillsbury Dough Boy.

MANY-HAHA

We'd TP her home, only it would be redundant.

Senator Elizabeth "Princess Running Gag" Warren has again refused to take a DNA test to settle the issue of whether or not she has an iota of Native American blood in her increasingly visible veins.

Warren insists that she has never benefitted from her claims of Native American heritage, although many believe it helped her land a cushy instructor's job at Harvard Law School. Perhaps because the school subsequently boasted about their newfound racial diversity thanks to adding this near-albino "woman of color" to their faculty.

Although Warren continues to treat her racial heritage as a mystery, she's being fairly transparent about her ambition to possibly run for the presidency (there are rumors that her "Redskin in the White House 2020" bumper stickers have already been printed).

But considering her ludicrous claims of Native American ancestry, we think she should have a reservation or two.

McDonalds Happy Male

We don't even want to think about the "special sauce."

Yesterday was International Women's Day, which is a perfectly good thing considering how many countries treat their women like livestock, and their livestock like women (you do not want to be a goat in the middle east).

That being said, we found McDonalds' attempt to honor the day more than a little odd, per the cartoon above. Theoretically, the inverted arches form a "W" for "women," but those of a certain mind set (not necessarily a healthy or wholesome mind set) may see it differently. A perspective only encouraged by McDonalds' newest slogan, "I'm lovin' it." Yeah, we'll bet you are!

Still, we don't want to be spoilsports, so we'll acknowledge that McDonalds deserves at least a little credit for giving women the world over a reassuring pat on their sesame seed buns.

A BAD CASE OF THE DSTs

This weekend it's time again to play the "Spring Forward, Fall Backward" game and change all of your clocks so that, in case you somehow managed to avoid getting gutted by this year's flu season, you can still experience a week's worth of exhaustion, nausea, and malaise.

At least, that's how it hits us - and it doesn't matter if it's Spring or Fall (we honestly don't understand the whole forward/backward thing), we always lose an hour or more of sleep and feel like crud for about three weeks.

Still we're sure our sacrifice is worth it to accomplish whatever the hell Daylight Saving Time is supposed to be accomplishing, like giving kids more light to glare at their school buses, or giving farmers an extra hour to try to wake their roosters, or cutting down on prostitution by turning on the street lights later.

Actually, we're not sure what the logic is behind this mess except to sell more coffee. And frankly, Daylight Saving Time, we don't give a damn.

Run Down Feeling

Actually, we're feeling just fine but we ran out of time to get much of anything done today. Which is just as well since we really hadn't come up with a red hot joke about Kelly Anne Conway possibly violating the Hatch Act (yawn) by expressing political opinions out loud.

And so we present you with our usual fallback. And in this case, a fall seems almost certain...

Just Another Manic Pun Day

Wait! Please hold your groans until all of the cartoons have appeared...

Okay, NOW you can groan. Although chances are pretty good that you were already groaning after stocks nosedived about 500 points when Trump announced his new tariff on imported steel and aluminum.

We don't personally have the economic insights to address the tariff with any expertise, but sources we usually respect - like the Wall Street Journal - are calling the tariff a yuge mistake. It will unquestionably raise the cost of many consumer items, perhaps negating the effects of the tax cut for some people, and may actually lose more American jobs than it creates.

Or maybe it will be a gigantic success, because who the heck can predict the outcome of any bare-knuckle dust-up between Trump and Reality these days?

For now, all we can do is watch, wait, and beg your forgiveness for the puns above.

Filmy Residue

Please tell us you recognize Oscar Wilde...

Sunday sees the annual return of the biggest alleged event in entertainment: the Oscars, wherein the creme de la creme of Hollywood glitterati will be honored for their latest and greatest achievements in hastening the decline of Western civilization.

Along with the awarding of golden statuettes which probably won't be used as sex toys, viewers can look forward to being scolded about the sin of seeing women as sexual objects by women whose actual sexual objects are bursting out of their designer gowns.

There will also likely be more than a few stern words spoken (accompanied by tears after plucking out a nostril hair offscreen) condemning guns by thespians who make millions by pretending to shoot dozens of blood-geysering people onscreen, then retreat to their mansions surrounded by heavily armed guards.

Politics aside, we suppose there might be some recognition of actual artistic merit, but we don't actually care because we haven't seen any of the nominated pictures. Why? Because the whole experience of visiting movie theaters sucks these days.

The prices are insane, there are always going to be 2 or 3 trailers which attack conservative values, and audiences have no concept of how to put their smartphones away and - oh yeah! - shut the hell up while the movie is playing.

Seriously, people who annoy us in movie theaters bring out homicidal tendencies which we're usually pretty good at suppressing. Which is why we weren't entirely without sympathy when reading the recent story of a woman, Shameeka Latrice Lynch, who attended a showing of "Black Panther" and got into an argument with another patron about who had the right to an assigned seat.  When rhetoric failed to resolve the issue, Shameeka hauled a pistol out of her purse and fired a round into the theater's ceiling.

But here's what bothers us: in all of the news stories about this regrettable incident, no one has reported whether or not it was actually her damn seat. Frankly, if some dirtbag was squatting in her reserved seat and refused to move, we think she's got a case.

In any event, this is why we wait for films to reach streaming outlets where we can enjoy them in the peace and quiet of our own homes, except when gunplay erupts over who'll get the best seat. And very rarely, we've even been known to venture out to the local Dollar Cinema (we're a lot more receptive to most movies when we're not out $30 before the show even starts) for the earliest showing on a weekday. Not only are the theaters mostly empty, but the few attendees tend to be retired folks who have the courtesy to either stay silent or simply fall asleep while gumming their popcorn.

So good luck to Hollywood, and may they enjoy their big night and the drug-fueled, sex-crazed parties afterwards. Most of which would probably make for more entertaining viewing than the dreck which actually hits the silver screens.

The Rhett Butler Memorial Dam.

One Good Term Deserves Another

And a fresh pair of Depends.

Donald Trump has finally ended the suspense, not that any had actually developed yet, and officially announced that he'll be running for President again in 2020.

This sets a new official record of early declaration for the office, but fails to surpass the unofficial record which was set when baby Hillary spoke her first words.

Trump has named a digital whiz to be his campaign manager and is currently assembling a team of creative writers to come up with catchy new hat slogans like "Keep America Trump Again" or "Eight is Great," as well as penning insulting schoolyard nicknames for potential opponents like "Oprah Lose-frey," "Braindead" Biden, and "Burned Out" Sanders.

Of course, one other highly-touted potential candidate is out there, and she's just announced a brand new book which will come out in (surprise!) November...

Because "Obama Sutra" was already taken by some asshole.

We're just kidding about the whole "sex manual" thing (probably) and don't actually know a whole lot about the upcoming book other than that Michelle is splitting a $60 million payday with Barry for her literary efforts.

Lest that seem like gross overpayment, the Obamas have been quick to point out that they will donate "an undisclosed but significant portion of their earnings to charity, including (wait for it!) the Obama Foundation." Once again, the left pocket won't let the right pocket go hungry.

The book is being called a "memoir" (which is French for "ghost-written) and will detail how Michelle became the woman she is today. We don't know if any of the chapters will involve hormone therapy or surgical procedures, and we're too high-minded to speculate.

An audiobook version will also be available, read by the former first lady herself, and is expected to finally wring the last useful information out of Guantanamo detainees who are forced to listen to it.

Month Upon a Time

Okay, we don't particularly have anything against Black History Month, but we didn't want this short month to pass without mentioning it - and slamming liberal hypocrisy at the same time. Because we genuinely believe that many liberals live their lives by the philosophy Lucy demonstrates in that last panel. After all, what fun is virtue signaling if no one is watching?

And because we're actively filling space today, here's a cartoon from the vault on the subject...

Of course, February isn't the only thing sputtering to a halt. The Winter Olympics in South Korea have finally drawn to a close and, despite the American team wowing the world and making our enemies cower by winning gold for "curling," we have no regrets about missing the whole darn thing.

Because despite the many events done in extremely different ways (as Basil Fawlty said on Gourmet Night), they all strike us as being variations on a single pointless theme: doing the hardest thing possible on a slippery surface without falling down.

So why not at least make events that people can really relate to, like having athletes race up iced apartment stairways while carrying grocery bags? Or seeing how fast athletes can use snow shovels to clear driveways? And why in the world is there no snowman-building competition?! No wonder television ratings stunk this year.

Of course, there are other ways to make the Winter Olympics interesting. Like by holding them in the summer. We present our case below...

Casual Friday

The news is uniformly dopey and annoying ("Momentum builds to give vote to 16-year olds"), so we're just keeping things light and pleasant here today.

First up, the captioned cartoon craze that's sweeping the nation...

And now, in keeping with the theme of the illustration above, we present some more random crap!

• THE KETO HAPPINESS - Weight Updeight

We're still sticking with the ketogenic diet we started at New Year's in an attempt to quickly lose enough weight to make another Ruth Bader Ginsburg (not that we'd want to), but success has been elusive. About 4 weeks in, we discovered we'd lost a grand total of 3 pounds. Obviously, something needed to change - so we've stopped weighing ourselves.

We're not noticing our clothes getting any looser either, which doesn't help motivate us to stick to a diet of meat, meat, and meat...with pork rinds for snacks. Whee.

But we're absolutely tearing it up at the YMCA's "Active Older Adults" exercise class. After just 6 short weeks, we can go as long as 5 minutes in class before we have to suck vigorously from our water bottle and gasp while our blue-haired classmates continue pumping iron while dancing.

We'll also note that there is an element of personal danger in these classes, as we're compelled to use the same kind of rubber exercise bands which allegedly beat the living hell out of Harry Reid once. The memory of which, we'll admit, is pretty much the only thing that makes us smile during our workout.

If you icepick it, it won't get better

Sliver Among the Gold

To hear the media leftists tell it, the Russian campaign to buy Facebook ads was a worse attack on the United States than the one which occurred at Pearl Harbor. That's not just our usual whimsical wordplay - that's what their talking points are currently saying: a worse attack than Pearl Harbor.

This tells us three things about these (unprintable) morons: they don't give a damn about history, they've never visited the Arizona Memorial (which is good, because it's hallowed ground), and if they ever do visit the Memorial they'll have to swim back to shore if they open their stupid yaps in front of actual Americans.

This kind of idiotic hyperbole can be dismissed with a shake of the head by rational adults of a certain age. But for younger viewers who have no actual concept of (or interest in) what Pearl Harbor represents, this kind of false equivalency can actually sway what passes for their minds.

So just how big and powerful was the Russian Facebook ad attack on America? And did those ads change the outcome of the election, as the left would have you believe?

According to an experienced campaign finance expert on Fox's "Tucker Carlson Show," the Russians spent $46,000 on Facebook ads. Meanwhile, the combined campaigns of Clinton and Trump (mostly Clinton) spent $81 million on Facebook ads (and that's not including buys from other political interest groups).

Crunching the actual numbers, this means that of all the campaign ads on Facebook, over 99.9% weren't originated by Russia. Making it pretty darn unlikely that Russia was able to tip the balance and impact the election - or even be heard over the clamor and clangor of the big money candidates.

Granted, the Russian disinformation campaign was more than a relatively microscopic number of Facebook ads. They also assaulted America with an infinitesimally small presence on Twitter and other social media sites frequented by people who enjoy a "less is more" philosophy when it comes to reading, thinking, and other challenging activities.

In closing, we just want the media to shut up about all of this, and especially want them to button their lips regarding any Pearl Harbor comparisons. Although we will concede that any day which saw the graduation of one of these buffoons from journalism school should be considered a date which will live in infamy.