Twitter Tragedy: A Cry for Help Unheard

Cleveland, OH -- The body of a young woman who will perhaps forever be known simply as sadgirl1188 was found early Tuesday morning in her apartment, dead of an apparent suicide. Was she a victim of the phenomenon of social networking?

Suzie Gernsall, who spoke on condition of complete lack of anonymity, said she had learned of her friend's demise through a mutual acquaintance. "She Twittered 'killing myself' and a little later,'dying'. But, honestly, I wasn't following her anymore. She'd turned into a real bummer. She stopped Stumbling stuff, her MySpace bulletins were out-of-date and her Facebook page went on and on about some girl named Sylvia Plath, who isn't even in our network--I checked. After that, I deleted her and told everybody else to, too. But she never knew. It's nice that you can do it like that now, so you don't hurt anybody's feelings."

The local pizza delivery person was shocked and saddened by the news. "She always ordered online because she didn't like to talk," he recalled. "I noticed it was taking her longer and longer to answer the door lately. Also, she was tipping a lot better."

Her brother, who lives in a nearby gated community, was devastated. "I hadn't seen her in a while but she'd installed a GPS tracker in her cellphone, so I always felt like I could keep an eye on her. She started wearing those adult diapers after we all heard about that crazy astronaut lady. She said it was just in case she got too depressed to get up from the couch when she had to go. But she seemed really into her new marketing blog, so I thought she was okay."

Although she had left out extra food and water and had died only hours earlier, the victim was found substantially gnawed on the areas of her body not covered by her filthy bathrobe. Police, shaken by the gruesome discovery, alerted Animal Control personnel, who removed her two cats, Dieter and Scooby, from the premises.

Within hours, images of their adorable bloodied maws began circulating the Internet with a petition to "Save the kitties. Send this to 7 people within the next 10 minutes and you won't believe what comes up on your screen. I don't know how, but this really works!!!" PETA is rumored to be mounting a vigorous defense of the felines, citing, among other things, "the irresistible succulence of human soft parts."

A search of the dead woman's email revealed thousands of unanswered Digg shouts and several "Is it time to reorder?" queries from Vitamin Shoppe.

A source inside Twitter remarked that the site sometimes goes down for maintenance, causing a member's lifestream to be briefly interrupted without warning. An upgraded suicide filter is said to be in the offing.

A neighbor of the dead young woman waxed philosophical when informed of the loss. "I don't know if you could call it a tragedy, really. I mean, the girl didn't really have any friends."

June 13 is National Pigeon Day- Ask Your Boss for the Day Off

June 13 is National Pigeon Day in Central Park.I found this announcement in New York Magazine:

"We’re trying to promote a positive image,” says New York Bird Club founder Anna Dove.... “There’s such negativity for no reason. They’re harmless, defenseless. They can’t attack; their beak is very soft.”

It's great that these disease-carrying merde machines that crowd out other bird species are having their day in the sun. I would like to submit a few more unsung heroes that I believe deserve to be honored.

The Asian longhorned beetle immigrated from China in cargo containers and feeds on maples and elms in New York City, helping us control the rampant tree population,since the only remedy is to chop them down.

Then there's the Chinese emerald ash borer that's helped to rid us of over 6 million ash trees in the Midwest. To paraphrase Springsteen (or Edwin Starr, if you're a purist), "Trees-what are they good for?"

Possibly the most overachieving of these heroes is a plant. Kudzu came here from Japan in 1876 as a decorative plant.It grows an amazing 1 foot per day, smothering native plants and killing trees with its vines. Like something out of the X-Files, it has taken over many southern states and is on its way north. Then we can have National Kudzu Day when it's overgrown everything else in Central Park. Hey, at least it won't hurt our precious pigeons.

Kids will learn cool pigeon facts...as they nibble on pigeon-shape cookies, view pigeon-inspired children’s art, and take part in a candlelight prayer service.(Dove worries there might not even be urban pigeons in five years.)

Hey, here's a cool pigeon fact. They eat meat. I remember one munching on my KFC like some happy cannibal reenactment on the Discovery Channel.

Meanwhile, she urges all New York families to “carry a bit of bread crumbs in your bag, a few seeds to show kindness and respect. The pigeon isn’t a threat or an enemy. It goes along with quality of life to show kindness and compassion to all living things.” That’s a lovely lesson for the children.

Yes, littering- what a great lesson. Here's another one. Have your kids wait until after dark to see who feasts on the castoff pigeon cookie crumbs and detritus you've left in your thoughtless wake. That's right, folks: our friend the Norway rat. He lives on unintentional handouts, like those yummy crumbs dropped from the pudgy little fingers of adorable children who want to feed the pretty birdies.

But let us not forget what is perhaps the greatest lesson of all. Make sure your kids toss those crumbs right next to the feet of a homeless man. This is a great way to teach your children about irony. He might've enjoyed that pastry you crumbled up before you came to the park. He'd definitely drop some crumbs around him to feed the pigeons. You know, those homeless have no manners.

And the Circle of Life continues.

Je suis arrivée!

I have arrived! This is such a proud moment for me. I received this email from BlogRush today, a wonderful company that helps bloggers get more traffic in exchange for putting a large link on one's site.

This message is to inform you that
we have carefully reviewed your blog:
Magick Sandwich
And your blog did not meet the
strict BlogRush quality criteria.

Reason Your Blog Wasn't Approved:
Inappropriate Content Or Advertising: Obscene or Disgusting

Therefore, your blog has not
been approved for use in our network.
Please do not take this decision personally.
We have decided to only approve the highest quality blogs
for our network.
You should remove the BlogRush code from your blog's pages.
If you improve the quality of your blog, and you feel that
it then meets our strict criteria,you can try and resubmit your blog for review after 30 days.
Thank you for your interest in BlogRush.
Best Regards,The BlogRush Team.

Oh my God, this is so exciting- my content is obscene or disgusting! Not to quibble, but obscenity and disgust aren't mutually exclusive, are they?

But this is not a wholesale rejection- oh, no. If I can "improve the quality" of my blog, I can reapply after thirty days. Does this mean I just need to be more tastefully obscene? What does this word mean, anyway?

obscene adjective:
1. designed to incite to indecency or lust; "the dance often becomes flagrantly obscene"-Margaret Mead 2. offensive to the mind; "an abhorrent deed"; "the obscene massacre at Wounded Knee"; "morally repugnant customs"; "repulsive behavior"; "the most repulsive character in recent novels" [syn: abhorrent] 3. suggestive of or tending to moral looseness; "lewd whisperings of a dirty old man"; "an indecent gesture"; "obscene telephone calls"; "salacious limericks" [syn: lewd] WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University

Wow. That sounds like a review of Pink Flamingos.I'm not fit to touch the hem of Mr.Waters' raiment: he is the Jesus of filth. So how can I tell when I'm being obscene? Like Justice Potter Stewart, will I know it when I see it? I certainly can't imagine how to reverse something like disgust.Frankly, I'm a little thrilled to excite such a strong emotion.

Somehow, this is like the maxim that until you are mugged, you are not a real New Yorker. I prostituted myself to BlogRush and they said, "no, thanks, come back when you've washed up." Now I can say I'm a real Blogger. (And I can take off that frigging code!)

Idiocracy Now Qualifies as a Documentary

The movie Idiocracy will get a second chance with American audiences during its upcoming release as a documentary, say Hollywood insiders.Overlooked during its initial run as a comedy film, critics found the plot too farfetched, with a pro wrestler as president and a dumbed-down future in which Ow, My Balls! is the highest-rated TV show.

Thanks to the behavior of our president and the pretenders to his throne, this scenario is more "near-fetched" (to borrow from George Carlin) than ever. President Bush appears on Deal or No Deal.

Clinton, Obama and McCain pander to the fans on WWE RAW. Barack bowls. Hillary does shots.

Although Idiocracy is set 500 years in the future, it seems that our political hopefuls are appealing to the movie's constituency right now. Are we that stupid? There are ow-my-balls-ish signs: Farmer Wants a Wife, Living Lohan, a hundred seasons of America's Funniest Home Videos and counting. Et tu, Tom Bergeron?

Are the candidates that stupid? For an amusing yet sobering answer, check out this collection of the 2008 campaign's most embarrassing moments thus far.

Personally, I'm holding out for the La-Z-Boy with a toilet in it. Adult diapers were a good first step, but I believe in American ingenuity. Now there's a throne we can believe in.