It’s May Day, and that means it’s time to clean the blood of the workers from the machinery of capitalism.

Five Reactionary Rules of The Simpsons – Have you always wanted to read an 1,800 word dissection of The Simpsons written by a communist?  Today’s your day.  I love the internet, truly the home of the bizarre rant. 

Do you know The Simpsons?  Take our quiz – There are a lot of Simpsons quizzes out there, but this one gets linked because it has an answer I consider debatable.  The questions are divided up into “Easy” and “Hard”, but even the “Hard” questions are a snap if you’re a fan, except this one, “7: What was the name of Homer’s personal assistant?”  Now, my answer was Eugene Fisk; instead they went with the far better known “MoJo”.  I object though, MoJo was a helper monkey, Fisk was actually, at least for a short time, Homer’s assistant.  

Axing The Simpsons would be commercial suicide for Ten – There was a nervous rumor going around Australia the last week that the Ten network was going to stop running repeats of The Simpsons.  It turned out to be bogus (as the linked story shows) but it’s a nice reminder that a lot of people still depend on regular repeats.  As Zombie Simpsons increasingly polluted the syndication runs I changed how I watch repeats, first to the DVDs and now to the rips of the DVDs I’ve got on my PC.  Of course, not everyone has the financial and technical resources (to say nothing of the interest) required to do that.  When I think back to a time when I had to depend on the programming monkeys at local television stations to determine which episodes I got to watch, and when I got to watch them, it’s like a nightmare.  

The Simpsons help Character World fight recession – A British manufacturer of licensed crap is glad that Simpsons crap sells no matter how bad the economy is doing.  (Curiously, Simpsons is mentioned in the headline and there’s a photo of Homer, but the show isn’t mentioned in the actual story.)

Peter Rook: on dealing with that mysterious bump in the night – This guy’s wife used to make him investigate phantom burglars in his Homer Simpson underpants.  As uninteresting as that sounds, it’s actually much more boring if you read the whole thing.  

He’s still around you know.. – Sadly, this does not seem to be satire:

I’m tired of trying to convince my friends at pubs to go home and see for themselves how funny these new episodes are.. and I just want to send out a virtual plea.. check it out once more? Sure..I COULD go into details about the type of jokes they’re shooting out but I’m certain most of you have been feeling rather soured by the last few years of Simpson mediocrity..rest assured these new ones are good.

Oh, I’m feeling soured alright, but “these new ones” are just as bad as anything that’s come before them.  

Cherry Coke vs. the corn industry – Daniel Greenberg of the University of Arizona’s Daily Wildcat gets a gold star for usage.  He got the quote right and it worked in context.  Observe:

Cherry Coke uses corn syrup because, due to the artificial price controls, the high-fructose corn ingredient becomes much cheaper than processed sugar beets or canes. Sugar was once white gold. Even Homer (Simpson) once said, “A mountain of sugar is too much for one man. It’s clear now why God portions it out in those tiny packets.”

No mention of the plantation in Hawaii, but that’s okay.  Good work young man.  

‘Obsessed’ with cliches – The fact that Stringer Bell is in it doesn’t make me want to see it, neither does this choice excerpt:

He never strays or shows any signs of temptation as this girl flings herself at him. It’s like watching Ned Flanders try to fight off Edna Krabappel—never sexy, just uncomfortable and mildly amusing.

Flanders fighting off the advances of Krabappel sounds like something Zombie Simpsons would do.  I hope they didn’t read this.  

DINING REVIEW: Thai restaurant doesn’t take shortcuts on tasty dishes – Do you live in Colorado Springs and enjoy Thai food?  Then you’re in luck as this review uses Lisa Simpson to explain the discrepancies in spiciness one often finds at Asian restaurants.  

Man who Tasered himself goes free – Our old pal Ricky Hodgkinson walked on his possession of an illegal weapon charge, no jail time for the “Homer Simpson defence” guy.

Finally, Dave found this picture of a kid wearing a sweet Krusty balloon head on Flickr.  I’m no balloon expert, but that appears to be at least a dozen of them in there and it looks phenomenal.  All thanks go to Flickr user Extreme Craft.