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Thanks to April Orcutt for sending along the link to this probably-too-true-to-be-funny essay from the New Yorker‘s Shouts & Murmurs

Subject: Our Marketing Plan

by Ellis Weiner

Thanks to John Montgomery for sending along these photos from the Washington, D.C .Tea Party; they were circulating on the web in October, 2009, with this preface: The ancient Greeks said, “The Gods themselves are helpless in the face of stupidity.”

Thanks to John Montgomery for sending along a little silliness:

“If you can’t find the book you’re looking for,

it’s probably because you’re in the …

Thanks to Chris Lunn for forwarding these shots of one couple’s exceptionally creative response to the high cost of fuel:

Thanks to Dick Jordan for forwarding this—undocumented—travel humor, supposedly offered by an airline ticket agent who works in Washington, D.C.:

1. I had a congresswoman ask for an aisle seat so that her hair wouldn’t get messed up by being near the window. (On an airplane!)

2. I got a call from a congressman’s staffer, who wanted to go to Capetown. I started to explain the length of the flight and the passport information, and then he interrupted me with, ”I’m not trying to make you look stupid, but Capetown is in Massachusetts.”  Read more... (776 words, estimated 3:06 mins reading time)

Thanks to Kaye McKenzie for this link to the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, to which you can contribute by adopting or fostering an orphaned elephant or rhino.

Dr. Dame Daphne Sheldrick (“the first person in the entire world to successfully hand rear newborn fully milk dependent African Elephant orphans”) explains the organization’s philosophy: “Saving wildlife and wilderness is the responsibility of all thinking people. Greed and personal gain must not be permitted to decimate, despoil and destroy the earth’s irreplaceable treasure for its existence is essential to the human spirit and the well-being of the earth as a whole. All life has just one home — the earth — and we as the dominant species must take care of it.”  Read more... (270 words, 2 images, estimated 1:05 mins reading time)

Snicker-worthy road signs in the New York Times:

CRAPSTONE, England – When ordering things by telephone, Stewart Pearce tends to take a proactive approach to the inevitable question “What is your address?”

He lays it out straight, so there is no room for unpleasant confusion. “I say, ‘It’s spelled “crap,” as in crap,’ ” said Mr. Pearce, 61, who has lived in Crapstone, a one-shop country village in Devon, for decades.

Disappointingly, Mr. Pearce has so far been unable to parlay such delicate encounters into material gain, as a neighbor once did… [follow link for rest of article]

I could have titled this post Shameless Self-Promotion, because it’s about my first book, An Erotic Alphabet. This slim volume of ABC’s for adults celebrates eroticism in all its forms, from silly to sensual, playful to X-rated.

It’s a delightful combination (if I may say so) of naughtiness and humor; one reviewer called me “the Shel Silverstein of erotica.” Here’s a sample:

Z is for the zipper
Easy access, up and down.
Nothing is much quicker
For getting to the mound.  Read more... (183 words, estimated 44 secs reading time)

January 19, 2009

7:00 pm

From our friends at Litquake:
Litquake is pleased as punch to team up this year with SKETCHFEST, the nationally-prominent comedy festival that takes place each January at venues around The City! We will be co-presenting Celebrity Autobiography, the smash hit lit-meets-comedy event from New York City being performed here for the first time, in which an all-star cast reads hilarious celebrity memoirs live.

The cast includes “Saturday Night Live’s” Jason Sudeikis, as well as Michael McKean (“This is Spinal Tap”), Annette O’Toole (“Smallville”), Rachel Dratch (“SNL”), Scott Thompson (“Kids in the Hall”), Laraine Newman (“SNL”) and Celebrity Autobiography co-creators Eugene Pack and Dayle Reyfel.  Read more... (264 words, estimated 1:03 mins reading time)

Thanks to Bob Ecker for this link to Tom Lehrer’s Hanukkah in Santa Monica, a travel video if I ever saw one.

Please grant me the favor of occasional shameless self-promotion: The book (Hot Flashes 2: more sexy little stories and poems) I co-edited, along with Linda Watanabe McFerrin, is featured in a YouTube video. Please help us spread the link far and wide, as an experiment in virtual book promotion. We all want to learn to do that, don’t we?!

A young man named John received a parrot as a gift. The parrot had a bad attitude and an even worse vocabulary. Everything it squawked was rude, obnoxious and laced with profanity. John tried and tried to change the bird’s attitude by consistently saying only polite words, playing soft music and anything else he could think of to clean up the bird’s vocabulary.

Finally, John was so fed up and he yelled at the parrot. The parrot yelled back. John shook the parrot, and the parrot got angrier and ruder. In desperation, John grabbed the bird and put him in the freezer. For a few minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed. Then suddenly there was total quiet. Not a peep was heard for more than a minute.  Read more... (231 words, estimated 55 secs reading time)

Or do I mean social media *are* like ice cream? At any rate, here’s a fun video explaining: Social Media is like Ice Cream

For those who love word play, thanks to the Marina Bay Tides for these treats:  Read more... (119 words, estimated 29 secs reading time)

• I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian.
• She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.
• A rubber band pistol was confiscated from algebra class because it was a weapon of math disruption.
• The butcher backed into his meat grinder and got a little behind in his work.
• No matter how hard you push the envelope, it will still be stationery.

Not sure what to do next, now that you’ve written your book? The Book Launch 2.0 video will make it painfully clear. Plus, you’ll get a good laugh!

“WARNING” the site reads. “This game may make you smarter. It may improve your speaking, writing, thinking, grades, job performance… ” The oh-so-addictive-and-good-for-you-too vocabulary game works like this:  Read more... (119 words, estimated 29 secs reading time)

• You’re presented with a word.
• You click on the answer that best defines the word.
• If you get it right, you get a harder word. If wrong, you get an easier word.
• For each word you get right, FreeRice donates 20 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program.

Thanks to April Orcutt for sending the link to this clever site that will surely help you move quickly through writers’ block. She reports, “Newsweek said it lets you send “snarky” messages.”

And the winner of the Merriam-Webster Word of the Year for 2007 is: w00t. What, you say? According to the Merriam-Webster website:

w00t (interjection)
expressing joy (it could be after a triumph, or for no reason at all); similar in use to the word “yay”

Check out the website for the rest of the Top 10.

Reprinted with permission from “The Book Marketing Expert newsletter,” a free ezine offering book promotion and publicity tips and techniques. http://www.amarketingexpert.com

Thanks to Connie Gutowsky for sending this link to a Scrabble-like game called Chicktionary, in which seven hens cluck appreciatively each time you spell a word made from the letters they provide. It’s addicting.

Thanks to April Orcutt for sending this info about a market for stories. (Not necessarily travel-related, but I love flash fiction, quickies, and short stories, so I’m passing this along. And the Quickies are so short you can surely find time to write one. Maybe it would be a good activity for those times you just need to write something—anything—to get the creative juices flowing. Or for when you’re procrastinating about writing what you should be writing. Yep; been there.)  Read more... (232 words, estimated 56 secs reading time)

Thanks to Easy Going Books for this link to the Norad Santa Tracker. You might want to turn the sound down before clicking …

“Ever wonder what foods the Vikings ate when they set off to explore the new world? How Thomas Jefferson made his ice cream? What the pioneers cooked along the Oregon Trail? Who invented the potato chip…and why?” Thanks to Anna Lane for sending this link to a food timeline. It might come in handy next time you’re researching a story!

Thanks to Anna Lane for the link to this odd site showing national flags — from an advertising perspective.

Thanks to Anna Lane for sending this link to Dancing Matt, photojournalist and entertainer.

One less excuse; if he can do it, so can you: “An Italian writer decided to put his mobile phone to good use during his daily commute to and from work — by writing a book. Robert Bernocco, an IT professional took advantage of his travel time by writing a 384-page science fiction novel, Compagni di Viaggo (Fellow Travelers), on his Nokia using the phone’s T9 typing system.” From the International Business Times.

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