‘Oh, Alright. It’s 913-41… Wait, Is That An Affliction Shirt? Uh, I Have To Go.’

The biggest thrill of the day comes courtesy of the Star‘s photo set from a party at a place where I’d be murdered south Overland Park motorsports… dealer, or something. The photographer caught this priceless scene, where an obviously intoxicated female reluctantly gives her digits to a very demanding gentleman. Please believe us when we say you simply must look through every photo.

A nice story about Greensburg in today’s NYT, mentioning the work done by KU grad students and staff from local architecture firm BNIM.

Star Commenters FTW

A few posts ago, we shone our underwhelming spotlight on the Star‘s front-page toiletstravaganza, and the ensuing puns and populism therein. But man oh man — any attempt at humor made by these unimpressive twentysomethings pales in comparison to the Seinfeldian excellence brought to the party by the paper’s intrepid commenters, who saw fit to engage in a bit of scatalogical brinkmanship and one-up-ery. And now — because you really, really need to see this — we bring you the finest comments on the story from the Comment Brigade. To the Punmobile!

Audie Murphy – Number 1 in Number 2.

This story is full of crap . . .

This will put a lot less stress on the Muffin Monster I presume.

Great invention. Now make it bigger so people can flush themselves. Make it available to banks.

Send a gross to Washington!!

does this come with a “pruno” recipe book?

Sounds like this guy came up with this brand by sitting on the toilet too long.

I really need to take a Murphy!

[commences slow clap]

You know, sometimes you can sense when you’ve been bested. This, friends, is one of those times. Star commenters — for so long the target of our persecution and ire based upon their jackassery, thinly veiled racism, and grammatical sins — have defeated us. Those are some fine, fine jokes (except for the bank one; trying too hard, mon frere), and we admit that you’ve emerged victorious here. Savor it, anonymous jackals — we have not yet begun to fight.

Star‘s Toilet Story Dabbles In Puns, Scatalogical Humor, Populism

So apparently there’s a manufacturing company HQ’d in Lee’s Summit that makes toilets. Like, awesome toilets. The kind of toilet whose innovation and sheer technological genius will bring tears to your eyes. The city’s paper of record, rightfully so, has opted to showcase this font of waste-centric brilliance with a glowing front-page article. But all of that takes a back seat to another, more important exercise: allowing the paper’s staff to have a little fun with the subject — starting with the headline: “Lee’s Summit inventor flush with pride.” Oh, I see what you did there. The fun continues, though:

Murphy didn’t go to MIT or any other hoity-toity technology school. He went to Metropolitan Community College-Longview. But mainly he grew up in Independence a curious boy who liked to take things apart and put them back together.

Huh? How did pseudo-populist rage sneak into a front-page article? You couldn’t have gone with “didn’t go to an engineering school” or something similar? You really had to slam MIT (which is far more than a mere “technology school”) just to provide further evidence of the massive chip on this city’s shoulder? Odd. More:

“You’re going to see something you’ve never seen before,” he said.

He put 35 golf balls into the bowl and pushed the flush button. The balls danced about before shooting down the drain.

Next, he placed five units of artificial debris — shaped pretty much like you would expect — into the bowl. He thought a moment and added five more.

“That’s double the load,” he said.

A-hem. Pretty much like you would expect, eh? And “double the load”? Was this story written at a Sigma Chi party, perchance?

Our friend John over at Bottomline breaks down the Byzantine rules governing the Star‘s new furlough policy. Be warned: it’s like a GRE problem.

Dastardly Canine Thieves Strike Local Dog Treat Company

Have you no shame, local four-legged friends? We know that things are tough In This Economy, but knocking over a KCK dog treat manufacturer is just inexcusable. Or perhaps one of your human sympathizers did this for you? Seems a local delivery driver at Blackman Industries has fled, along with $3,000 (!) in dog treats. You know what that’s worth on the street?!? Probably, uh, a lot less.

The inventory was that much short on the deliveries then, Farbman said, and he can’t say for sure how much of the missing goods are Greenie treats, rawhide toys or pig ears, he said.

“I think it’s a little bit of everything,” he said.

In some cases the perpetrator submitted invoices to businesses, got paid in cash and dumped the invoices, Farbman said, and in other cases just took the goods…

The Greenies go for about $25 a pound, with a large pack selling for $19.99, he said, and some people would have jumped at the chance to buy them for half price.

All due respect to Stewart (Carl?) Farbman, but we think perhaps he’s greatly overestimating the black market for dog treats. In any event, we demand justice. Let’s get the KCKPD to stake out local Petco and PetSmart locations — just look for the man selling, um, pig ears from a trunk parked in back. And let’s keep a close eye out for this suspicious-looking man-dog.

A nice spotlight on a local company in today’s WSJ: OP’s Roger the Plumber earns a glowing write-up and interview. Honestly, though, we have to say that Roger does not own the best-named plumbing business in the metro area. That, of course, would be this one.

Will Herr Hesse Soon Prowl The Streets Of Bonn?

The boulevards of suburban Overland Park are abuzz this morning with news of the possible purchase of Sprint-Nextel-PCS-Global-Telephonium by DEUTSCHE TELEKOM! — because things in German must always be shouted — an action which would consolidate two losing companies under one roof. Hey, convenient!

But rumors of a deal between the two companies — the third- and fourth-largest carriers in the United States — keep popping up because Sprint and T-Mobile continue to lose money and lag far behind the larger Verizon and AT&T, said Michael Nelson, research analyst at Soleil Securities in New York.

“I think right now it’s clear that Sprint and T-Mobile are having an increasingly difficult time competing in the current environment, and there’s really no easy solution,” Nelson said. “It’s potential consolidation as a necessity.”

Ah, consolidation as necessity. Isn’t this like those sad middle-aged relationships that come about because neither party thinks he or she can do any better? So this divorcee from Gardner might just be the best option available? Sad, sad, sad. It’s of course been a long and winding road for Sprint, which acquired Nextel in an ill-advised joining of forces a few years ago. They’ve never quite been able to compete with the behemoths of Verizon or AT&T, and now it looks like another marriage is in the offing. Of course, this will again fail to answer that age-old question: why can’t I get service a mere mile from your sprawling and pretentious campus? And why do you keep hiring trenchcoat-ed men to stalk city streets?

After Visit To Village West Hooters, Cerner CEO Reveals Why Soccer Complex Really Changed Locations

Ahem. Here we see local businessman of note Neal Patterson explaining to his frat brothers exactly why the company chose the, er, ample real estate of WyCo over the sad-sack Bannister Mall area.

Axe-Wielding Mini-Ferrigno Ruins Renaissance Festival Opening

Quite a sight to behold from the Star‘s collection of Ye Olde Renaissance Festival And Feast Of Merlin Mead-Faire pictures. Apparently this wee lad misinterpreted this year’s “pirate adventure” theme as “you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.” Very odd. Of course, that’s not the only weird sight to be found in these pictures, which contain as much innocent nerdery and cringe-inducing decolletage as you can handle…