The Pryor Week #9: Corona and Pregnancy Tests
Hey, I hope you’re having an immeasurably pleasant week so far.
Here’s what I did:
Went down south to the bottom tip of Taiwan for some relaxing camping and a concert over the weekend.
Missed our exits several times during the trip because of captivating storytelling by friends (and perhaps myself) in the car, to which we infrequently shouted out “STORIES!” the rest of the week whenever we needed to blame something at random.
Slammed my knee on the ground during hockey after playing out-of-net the first time in months. I may have been a bit too overzealous for those precious goals—at least I got 1 under my belt. Time to go back in net me thinks.
Pic Descrip:
That beer cart up there covered in Corona was at the festival. We frequented it several times throughout the night because of the owner’s ability to make ‘super’ strong G&Ts. We found out the ‘super’ was a gamble between 50-90% extra gin—but keeping the common denominator of only costing $5 USD. Winning!
Upon immediate arrival at the car/bar/booth, I of course had to ask in a traditional snarky variety, “What kind of beer do you sell?” His response was as you would assume. Hilarious.
Some Interesting Things I Learned This Week
#1. Another weird technology find
Some say inventors can occasionally venture too far. This is probably an example of that.
What happens when you combine a bored programmer nerd and a pregnancy test?
Why, Pregnancy Test Doom, of course.
Probably not the punchline you were expecting. For some who the hell knows why reason, this programmer created an incredibly low-definition playable version of the old video game, Doom, on a pregnancy test. Simply weird.
And hilarious.
#2. The idiotic power of branding
It’s well known in the marketing industry the sheer power of a brand name vs an unknown one, and there are countless studies backing it up. But one thing popped up in my search for curiousness this week that was actually handy for me—how to get black marks off of white walls.
I’ve mentioned before my battle with the odd magical Taiwanese bugs that appear in my latest apartment from time to time (AKA every day). But recently I upped my game in the fight, I armed myself with an awesome flyswatter.
The results:
The effectiveness of pest disposal has increased at least threefold.
The tiny body stains on my walls have also increased commensurately, unfortunately.
So, to fix that, I found this magical product called Magic Eraser by Mr. Clean, you’ve probably heard of them if you aren’t also a 37-year-old boy-man whose apartment is dirtier than a street 3 hours after a parade rolled through.
Anyway, turns out that fancy product introduced in the early 2000s was just a copied book with a fancy cover. The product behind “Magic Eraser” is easily found on Amazon and whathaveyou for far cheaper (seemingly up to 80% cheaper).
Just search for “melamine foam sponge” and enjoy the savings in the future, presumably during your own battle with incessant flying bugs from Taiwanese hell.
#3. Omnipotence or impotence?
Andrew Carnegie was one of America’s (and the World’s) first uber-rich. But like Warren Buffet, at some point along the way of massive wealth extraction from society, he realized he should probably give some of it back.
According to Wikipedia, “During the last 18 years of his life, he gave away around $350 million (roughly $5.2 billion in 2020).” That’s nothing to sneeze at.
But perhaps on a more interesting layer, $40 million of that was purely donated for the “construction of 1,679 public libraries across the United States, according to an article in the American Library Association Bulletin by historian George S. Bobinski.”
A few years later, the same guy was also behind the deaths of many workers trying to unionize after he hired the infamous Pinkertons to violently quell a basic workers’ rights movement.
Like most things in life, facts and people are often a mixed bag of good and bad. Unlike peanut butter tuna sandwiches, which are 100% heavenly.
That’s it for today folks. I haven’t been ‘fun’ writing for almost two weeks now as I still try to sort out my international banking issues and instead have to focus on side-work.
But the urge hit me tonight, so I couldn’t help it. Surprise!
Anyway, I hope all y’all are safe out there! Until next time peeps.
This message has been brought to you by J.J. Pryor.
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I think yelling "stories" is a polite way of saying "bull shitting". Careful with those G & T's. That tonic can really sneak up on you.
Misread the title. Could not figure out how COVID and pregnancy tests could be combined. Think I need one of those beers. Thanks for the smile on Friday