This week’s link dump is really just a grab bag, but when I was looking it over I noticed that I’ve got lots of extended block quotes.  Though we also get some excellent usage and not a single old person complaining about anything.

Shitty Bands Whose Names Have Awesome Pop Culture References – Pretty much exactly what it says.  There are three Simpsons bands.

5 Best Simpsons Halloween Segments – It’s five segments from various Treehouse of Horror episodes that were based on actual horror movies.  There’s two from Zombie Simpsons although one of them, the dolphin segment from Season 12, is quite possibly the only funny thing in Season 12.

DSM-IV Assessment – Hey kids!  Want to see professional psychology applied to Agnes Skinner?

The Future of Search – This is a speculative article on how search type advertising can be brought to television.  It correctly quotes Homer, twice.  Double excellent usage.

Got Plans? – The Washington Post has a dating/entertainment advice section (of course it does) run by people who are actually referred to as “The Going Out Gurus”.  They had an on-line chat yesterday and one of the “gurus”, David, dropped some old school Simpsons on the crowd:

breakup spots: At first I was thinking, “man up and do it at your house” but then you do look like the jerk who made her come to your house to just break up with her. And she doesn’t want the memory in her place so I suggest a hotel lobby/bar.

David: I think a simple letter will do, no need to be there in person. “Dear baby, Welcome to Dumpsville. Population: you.”

This being the internet some moron took it seriously:

Canal for breaking up: Unless they’ve been together a while and then she might think he’s going to propose!

David, I also hope you were joking with the letter. To the guy, break up in person, its the right thing to do.

David: Yes, of course I was joking. “The Simpsons,” anyone?

Three simple words: You are dumb.

Comedy and alcoholism a likely mix – Comedians drink and use drugs?  No!  Surely not!  Anyway, he does use Homer’s “to alcohol” quote correctly and for that he gets a gold usage star.

Fairbanks kayaker completes Yukon River Quest – After kayaking for 410 miles over three straight days, this guy started hallucinating.  Amongst other things, he saw Homer and Marge.  It could’ve been worse I suppose.

The High Cost Of Buying ‘Cheap’ – This is an NPR story about a new book, “Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture” by Ellen Ruppel Shell.  This is from an excerpt from the book:

I n Sweden we visit IKEA, the global furniture retailer made famous and fabulously successful by a scheme of designing not just for low price but to low price. The consequences of this are both obvious and subtle. IKEA makes furniture available to all at a low price, which means college students, young couples, and others on a budget can furnish their homes in style. But IKEA does not overly concern itself with what Homer Simpson calls “fall-apart.”

Sigh.  Homer doesn’t call it “fall-apart”.  The salesman at the outlet mall does.  Here’s the original exchange in all it’s glory:

Bart: “Don’t be a sap dad, these are just crappy knock-offs.”

Homer: “Pfft.  I know a genuine Panaphonics when I see it.  And look, there’s Magnetbox and Sorny.”

Salesman: “Listen, I’m not going to lie to you, those are all superior machines.  But, if you like to watch your TV, and I mean really watch it, you want the Carnivalé.  It features, two pronged wall plug, pre-molded hand grip well, durable outer casing to prevent fall apart.”

Homer: “Sold.”

This is another case of poor Simpsons citation actually weakening an argument.  She certainly doesn’t need to quote the whole thing, but if anything the Carnivalé and it’s real world brethren are perfect examples of what she’s talking about.

Homer Simpson from The Simpsons (1989-) – This is the same blog that had the profile of Grandpa last week.  Once again quote accuracy is not a priority, but I can’t let this one go without calling it out:

“Oh, people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. 14% of people know that”

Forfty!

(Also on Nostalgye are some quick hit posts from the show.  Worth a click and a chuckle.)

The Big Hurt: Parse and labor The week in unhelpful headlines – This guy writes about music and ponders the sometimes bizarre headlines he sees:

“DIRTY PROJECTORS SHIFT GEARS ON ‘ORCA’ “ | I feel like Lisa Simpson upon seeing the Yahoo Serious Film Festival marquee — I know all those words, but they don’t add up. I just appreciate the pure surrealism here. Imagine a man waking up from a 30-year coma and seeing this headline. “The future is a strange and terrible place,” he’d say, before lapsing back into troubled sleep.

It actually just says “Yahoo Serious Festival”, but that’s still highly cromulent usage.

Mass Effect 2 Designer Talks Insanity Difficulty Mode and Unlocking – This is an extended discussion of very hard video game difficulty levels.  But there is a slightly misquoted but otherwise excellent Lisa reference:

Everyone differs when it comes to what they prefer in terms of challenge within a video game. Some people don’t want any challenge at all; they just want to relax and immerse themselves in another world. Meanwhile, there are others who want their games to punch them in the face, shake their teeth off of its fist, and then tell it “c’mon, gimme another.”

And for the record? I’m sort of in the “Lisa Simpson” category, in that I want “a challenge I can do!”

Hooray for workable usage.