reason is the reason

“How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, that has such people in’t!” – Miranda, the Tempest, Act V, Scene 1

“[My stage personality] is my true personality, but it’s not an angry personality. Anger is a handy term and boy words are tricky, as we know. What one man perceives as anger, another person—in my case the deliverer of material—is, ‘Don’t you see it, don’t you see how badly you’re doing?’” Psychology Today has George Carlin’s last interview, and boy is it a good one.

“The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends…. What do you get at the end of it? Death! I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you’re too young, you get a gold watch, you go to work. You work forty years until you’re young enough to enjoy your retirement. You do drugs, alcohol, you party, you get ready for high school. You go to grade school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating… and you finish off as an orgasm.”

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Comedian George Carlin, a counter-culture hero famed for his routines about drugs, dirty words and the demise of humanity, died of heart failure at a Los Angeles-area hospital on Sunday. He was 71.

“I think it’s the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately.” George Carlin said it, and he couldn’t have been more right.

His work had become darker, more cynical, almost more hateful of late, sounding almost like he took pity on the human race while he verbally took it apart. “[The human race is] a big freak show,” he once said. “You gotta just enjoy it. That’s my attitude. The human race is destroying itself slowly and it’s wonderful to watch.”

While a lot of Late Carlin is good listenin’ (take a listen to “There Is No God” for Carlin’s inimitable takedown of religious belief), I much prefer his earlier stuff - whimsical, playful, and only a touch too cynical about the world.

My favorite, as always, was “Seven Words You Can’t Say on Television.”

Now what happens? I foretell an outpouring of grief from the entertainment community. Ben Affleck and Kevin Smith will be reminiscing about George on the set, while fellow comedians like Jay Leno will talk about what a great guy George was.

Judging from his material, George Carlin (if he was still alive) would think they were just blowing smoke up his ass. Buy hey, George, they’re down here and you’re wherever the fuck you are, so let them be for now, OK?

More stuff from George Carlin:

• A Salon interview from 1999.
• Time Magazine asks ten questions of George Carlin.
• 101 Best George Carlin Quotes.
• Positive Atheism’s Big List of George Carlin Quotes.
• Shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, and tits.
• A different look at George Carlin, through essays written by his daughter Kelly Carlin-McCall: “The Day the Sun Exploded” and “Mother’s Day”.

Rest in peace, motherfucker.

Visitors to Manila are well advised to bring some sturdy headgear, as babies are being constantly thrown from windows.

Tourists in Binondo have complained after narrowly missing being hit by a baby thrown from a condominium last week.

Just a few hours later, traffic in Paco was aggravated by a baby thrown from a moving taxi.

“Manila’s a great city, but I think they’re a bit lacking in the baby clean up department,” says Jock Frawley, a visitor from Australia. He says he almost missed Carlos Celdran’s walking tour because of the Paco baby situation.

“How can I enjoy the sights of the city, when the air is thick with flying babies?” complained Abel Goldberg, a visitor from Brooklyn. Read more…

Fixed that for you. College Dean says to the head of the Chemistry Department: “You want more equipment?? My Lord, your department is costing us a bundle! Why can’t you be like the math department? They only need pencils, paper, and a trash can! Or like the philosophy theology department? They only need pencils and paper!”