Link: NYT presents Mad Magazine fold-ins

About a month ago some blog or another linked to this interactive archive of Mad Magazine fold-ins in the NY Times. I enjoyed it immensely and promptly forgot about it until yesterday when in a conversation with my brother the topic of Mad came up. I explained that the archive is animated so you can drag the fold, to which he replied (slightly incredulous), "So you mean the folds actually line up?!" Indeed.

If only he had managed to disappear until after the election

According to the NYT, Gary Dodds of New Hampshire "was convicted of faking his disappearance after a car crash two years ago to draw attention to his Congressional campaign." Was the car crash intentional? I'm sure a little googling could clear this up further, but I think I prefer the mystery. I mean, clearly the accident was something he could walk away from just fine considering that he, you know, walked away just fine. And yet he thought that he could believably disappear for 27 hours. In any case, this guy is clearly a go-getter. If I were in a car crash my first thought would not be "How could this further my career? Would laying low for a day or so with my feet in a bucket of cold water to simulate exposure somehow help?" This is why I will almost certainly not hold elected office. Or even fail to win an election and then go to jail like Gary. But even though it didn't work out this time, if he hadn't tried an insane, Three's-Companyesque zany plot and had lost the race, he would've always wondered what could've been if he'd just been committed enough to pretend he had spent a day nearly drowning in a river.

Give me money now, maybe get more money in return later!

I read an article yesterday in the Times (isn't that a classy way to start a blog post?) about a minor league baseball player selling shares against his future major league earnings. It's like stocks or futures or something; I don't really know because finance isn't really my thing. What is my thing, however, is being the second person to an idea. So as a young man with a potentially lucrative career in comedy in front of me, I'm offering the opportunity to invest in me the comedian now for a potential payoff later. It works just like it does in the article I linked to above but you probably didn't bother to read because I summarized it so well: give me twenty dollars US-American currency in exchange for 0.002% of my future earnings as a comedy writer and/or performer on tv or film. Just so you know, the break even point is one million dollars. I earn a cool million, you get your twenty back. But all I have to do is be as successful as Adam Sandler or Mike Myers and you'll make two or three grand. How sweet would that be for all involved? So by now you're totally ready to jump on board I'm sure. I was going to set up a paypal account, but according to the article the guy got in trouble with the SEC which I think is like the IRS for rich people (not sure--again, finance isn't my thing). So we'll be conducting this strictly on a cash basis. Slip me a Jackson next time we run into each other and give me a large, exaggerated wink, and I'll write you name down in my payback book.

So there you have it. Looking forward to running into you. *WINK*