While the guys in back all have finger guns, the guy in front is praying for a real one.

Seen in the magazine rack while waiting on a checkout line in a New Jersey supermarket in an upscale neighborhood: "Pregnancy for Dummies."

I know that one. It comes with condoms that already have holes in them. What'll they think of next.

Where's the sleeping emoticon?

Are you sure it's mexican, not brazilian?

(Sorry, couldn't help myself)

Just realized, although there were PLENTY of clues, if I had read everything all along, that Jane Stern (Roadfood) is a member of my perfume board.

Darn, I never thought of her as a scent person. Michael either. More "We smell of smoke 'n' grease and we're damn proud of it."

One of my office friends mentioned today that she'd told a coworker that she was thinking of going to Cambodia, and the coworker said "What's Cambodia?" (We work for a travel company, so this is a little bizarre.)

I told her to explain that it's a big festival, like Burning Man.

On second thought, maybe I should have said it was a big store, like Target.

While heading to the library some guy walked past me and made a comment that sounded like "nice boobs." As I didn't respond, he then said "you're welcome" when I realized he actually said "nice boots."

She likes jewelry, too. And she's very funny.

Don't let Scorched Palate see this post.

Turkey is for thanksgiving, not Easter.

OK. I guess you had to be there.

I keep forgetting to post about this. Okay, hold these two thoughts in your head:

1. If you're a New Yorker, you have probably come across the potato-peeler spieler. The nattily dressed gent with the white hair and the English accent, who squats around town - Union Square, Sixth Avenue - demonstrating and selling five buck potato peelers. Right? And let me mention that the peelers are superb, and worth every cent.

2. A couple of years ago, I dined solo at Atelier. Being "known to" the restaurant, I naturally had the chef "cook for" me. It was very soignee, of course. . Knowing it would be a long meal, I ordered a bottle of wine to follow my aperitif. At the next table sat an older couple, a man with a British accent, and his American female companion. I could hear him muttering about me: "Look, 'e's 'ad a glass of champagne, an' now 'e's ordered a bottle of wine, all for 'isself." I never forgot that.

Those of you who have seen the current Vanity Fair magazine will guess where this is going. It features a profile of the dextrous potato-peeler, and reveals that he is a street seller by day, and haunts the city's fanciest restaurants by night. And of course it was none other than he sat next to me at Atelier.

But without seeing the VF article, I don't think I would ever have realised that they were one and the same man.

He must sell a lot of potato peelers. I have one. I wonder how many other MFs have them?

I have one

Me too. Bought it at Union Square because the spiel was so much fun, but it is a great peeler.

That's one of the nice exchanges in the VF article: How do you make money selling five dollar potato peelers? "You sell a lot of them."

I had dinner on Monday night with a man who once ran a narcoleptic dog colony.

He must sell a lot of potato peelers. I have one. I wonder how many other MFs have them?


See poll in "At the shops" (I tried, unsuccessfully, to link to it.)

That's got to be the easiest job ever.

It must be tiring taking the dogs for a drag twice a day.

The newest member is Andy Lynes

The Stanford narco dogs?? They are AWESOME, a whole family bred to pass out on demand!!!! They used to break them out for psych 101 and have them fall asleep for everyone.... My old advisor is famously narcoleptic (he fell asleep in my thesis defence, although the jury is out whether or not that was because of the narcolepsy) - a truly bizarre condition to interact with. The whoel rhythm of sleep, waking and dreaming seems to get confused, as well as just the obvious seizures. Very very odd.

I think so. (How many narcoleptic dog colonies can there be?)

And a new surreal topic... (How can you turn the damn continuation off?)

Andy Lynes. Fuck me.

No you're safe Glyn, you're not a chef.

Don't hit the 'reply' button with the quotation marks in it, but scroll down and hit the 'add reply' feature containing the page icon.

That just seems to append the new post the previous one.

As you can see.

Well, why are you listening to me? I after all may very well be responsible for locking a thread without having the foggiest idea I had done so.

Back to you on this.

OK, I just tried following my instructions above and you see the results.

It worked for me earlier.

One the biggest tourist attractions in Napa Valley is the narcoleptic goats.

I have been sniggering over this exchange all day.

It's been a rough week.

Never mind.

Speaking of dogs....

I have a close friend. She has a son, Drew, who's twenty something.

I just had this conversation with her...

"How's Drew? Is he seeing anybody?"

"No. He was dating this one girl. Liked her a lot, but her job finally got to him, so he broke it off."

"Her job?"

"Yeah. She's a doggie psychic. Makes good money, too. Can you believe people really pay for that?"

"Well, I guess it takes all kinds. And I've heard about that sort of thing. But why did it cause Drew to stop seeing her?"

"Because no matter where they were, or what time of day or night, her cell phone kept going off, and she'd answer it, and it'd be people saying, 'Something is wrong with Fido and I'm really worried. Can you listen to him bark or whine or whatever and tell me what it is?' and then she'd sit there listening to her cell phone barking, and she'd be channeling the doggie spirits or whatever it was she channeled, trying to figure out what was wrong, and then telling them stuff like, 'He doesn't want to poop in the front yard anymore because it's so public, try the back' or 'he's mad at you because you left him alone all afternoon.' I mean everywhere. Even in nice restaurants. She never turned it off. She said her clients needed her. It got to be too much for him."

A rather unusual sales pitch for a used Mercedes:



and it goes on for another five paragraphs.

Car for sale

Boy, that's surreal, okay.

I thought I would offer her $1000 plus a 357 Mag. pistol for the car.

No balls at all if you don't.

Right now, one of the active users is Google.com.

A testament to the quasi-anarchic nature of the site.

Click.

Well, OK, as long as it wasn't his hands.

I signed up a new case today (yes, lawyers make house calls). The client is a woman I have known for about 45 years. (Her daughter, son-in-law, Lippy and I were all in school together back then.) She was struck by a car making a left turn as she legally crossed that horrifying corner where West 65th, Broadway and Columbus all meet and cars illegally make left turns on the red light. What puts it on this thread is that as soon as she was struck, someone ran out from Bed Bath and Beyond and put one of their blankets on her, her doorman came over and took back to her building the shopping bag she was carrying and a frummie ran up and said a brucha over her.

Sometimes it is hard to avoid the path of an eager political climber. Last Thursday morning there was one in my way as I prepared to swipe my Metrocard. Running for state senate, he said. I asked him his position on banning foie gras production in New York. "Excuse me, ma'am, could you repeat your question?" I did, and elaborated just a bit.

His position? "I am against ALL animal testing!"

Fan, that's priceless.

Walking along 28th St. yesterday, I passed two guys - one standing, one seated at a leaflet-covered table - shilling something or other. The stander waved his arms at me and cried, "How are you?? His name is Lloyd!" Sitter: "My name is Lloyd!!"

We're staying in a hotel complex in Bogota that is more like a high-end compound. Security not only at the entrance to the parking garage, but also at the walk-in entrance to the compound. The security consists of a guard with a bomb-sniffing dog. Whenever you walk up, the dog sniffs your bags. I went to get a pizza for a party last night at the hotel: when I returned, the guard saw my pizza box and simply waved me through with a "bendigo" (blessings).

Eyebrows' father, who has been dead for more than 4 years, continues to get credit card offers, and credit cards, mailed to him several times a week.

I just recognized Omni's signature. I thought it was just some weird language she was showing off in.

Put'em together and waddya got? bibbidee bobidee boo