21st Century Dioramas

By Rick Kaempfer & Dave Stern




You remember the diorama, those mini landscapes in a shoebox that you were forced to build for school? Sadly, the technological revolution has all but killed our pal. Inexplicably, kids these days don’t enjoy pipe cleaners, crepe paper, glue and little plastic horses as much as we did. They still have to do dioramas, but they don’t revel in them because they’d rather do projects on their fancy-schmancy computers.

This has got to end. That’s why we’ve created a couple of easy to build dioramas that will make the diorama more relevant for today’s kids. Unplug the Play Stations, turn off the iPods and grab the kids, it’s time for some family fun Half Empty style.

1) Paris Hilton’s Adventure
(supplies needed: shoebox, 1 toothpick, 1 marshmallow, 10 pipe cleaners and “Cellmate Barbie”)

Create Paris by inserting toothpick into marshmallow (the marshmallow is her head). Arrange and glue pipe cleaners to form a jail cell. Pose “Cellmate Barbie” behind Paris.

2) Tom Cruise’s 9th Level of Hell
(supples: shoebox, computer, internet access, old antidepressant prescription bottles)

Ok, so you need to go get the computer, sorry. Download cutout of Tom Cruise. Print doll and glue him in the middle of the box. Fill box with empty prescription bottles. Inserting ax wielding Brooke Shields is optional.

3) Heather Mill’s Wind “fall”
(supplies: Piano box, Dancing Barbie Doll, $32,000,000 in cash)

Rip the left leg off the Barbie doll. Paint a cheesy television dance floor set on cardboard. Fill box with cash.

4) Don Imus and Michael Richards job prospects
(supplies: shoebox, nothing else)

5) Robert Downey Jr’s Dresser Drawer
(supplies: shoebox, large amount of white powdery substance like sugar or flour)

Fill entire shoe box with substance.

6) Chicago Cubs World Series Chances
(supplies: orange crepe paper, Styrofoam ball)

Cover inside of box with orange crepe paper, to create an inferno effect. Tape “snowball” to bottom of the box.

If you have any other ideas, email us and we’ll post them. We bet you never knew we were so artistic. By the way, Rick is resting comfortably after slicing his finger off on the Tom Cruise doll.

MOUNT RUSHMORE

By Rick Kaempfer & Dave Stern




Let us put men and women together, see which one is smarter,
Some say men, but I say no, women got the men like a puppet show.

It ain’t me it’s the people that say, men are leading women astray,
I say, it’s the women today, smarter than the men in every way,
That’s right the women are smarter, the women are smarter that’s right.

"Men Smart, Women Smarter" by the Grateful Dead


We admit it. Our wives are smarter than us. In fact, we have no problem with it. There is very little downside. We aren’t asked our opinion on important stuff. When the computer is broken we don’t have to fix it. When our kids have homework, they insist on helping.

Sadly, we also have to admit that our sisters are smarter than us too. Both of them graduated Magna Cum Laude, while we graduated Magna Cum Lucky. Both of them were some sort of “dictatorian” in high school. Both of them left high paying jobs in the private sector so they could give back to the community by teaching.

And that’s a problem.

Honestly, we're not jealous of their achievements, and we aren't suffering from an inferiority complex just because our sisters are smarter (and better) than us. In fact, if our mothers didn't point this out at every possible occasion, we wouldn't even notice.

But oh how our mothers notice. Evidently, having a child do something worthwhile is a big deal with them. Who knew? Since we have allowed our sisters a more than 40 year head start, we have to do something big to catch up.

Really big.

We need you to sign this petition:

To: National Park Service, United States Department of the Interior and the United States Congress

We, the undersigned, urge that the likenesses of Richard J. Kaempfer (Resident of Mount Prospect, Illinois) and David F. Stern (Resident of Chicago, Illinois) be carved into Mount Rushmore located in South Dakota immediately. Whereas, we defer to your discretion, we would prefer that Mr. Kaempfer and Mr. Stern be placed to the left of Abraham Lincoln. This is in honor of Mr. Stern’s award winning sixth grade poem entitled, “Honest Abe, He Was Called”

We, the undersigned, feel that Mr. Kaempfer and Mr. Stern would provide perfect company for George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. Whereas, Mr. Kaempfer or Mr. Stern haven’t technically served as United States President they both have voted in nearly every presidential election since 1984. They also are no strangers to the rigors of the political process having run for Homecoming King (Richard) and Queen (David) at the University of Illinois in 1985.

Finally, the undersigned, urge that upon acceptance of this petition that Mr. Stern’s likeness be carved with a full-head of hair and Mr. Kaempfer’s likeness be carved with a small nose. In a thousand years, who will ever know?

That will surely impress our impossible-to-impress German bred mothers.

We figure we will need approximately 3,000,000 signatures. Currently we have 21. Actually, if you discount us and blood relatives we have 18. Yet, this small grassroots crusade is energized and gaining steam.

Look what some of the undersigned have said;

Ryan Maffett--HECK OF A POEM.... SIXTH GRADE TOO

Mama G Winters--For the love of all that is good, please comply with this simple request!

Michael Caron--All I know is there better be one hell of a dedication ceremony/party if ya know what I mean.

And our favorites:

Big Ron---Zieg Heil!

Osama---What up wit dat???

Please go to Dave & Rick on Mt. Rushmore petition and help us out. If you have the time, please forward it to as many people as you can.

If we do succeed, it will be a victory for all stupid brothers everywhere. Above all, mention it to our mothers every chance you get.

THE AMERICAN DREAM

By Rick Kaempfer & Dave Stern







What is the American dream? If you work hard, and go the extra mile, your loyalty and diligence will be rewarded.

Sounds great, doesn’t it?

Unfortunately, in this largely unregulated free market era, nearly every industry has become dominated by huge corporations. Once you work for one of these soulless, faceless giants, the American dream doesn’t really apply anymore.

People can reward loyalty, diligence and hard work; corporations cannot. To a corporation, a worker is an expense. When it’s time to cut expenses, (and it will always eventually be time to cut expenses), loyalty, diligence and hard work rarely enter the equation. This is why Wall Street gets a boner when a corporation announces mass layoffs. Bye, bye expenses.

It’s nothing personal. It’s just business.

The person who rises to the top of this sort of business has to be cold, calculating, and detached in order to maximize profits. He must see the worker as a meaningless cog. A number. A part of the financial equation. No more. No less.

The boss’ job is to get maximum output from his overworked employees without raising expenses. The only way this can work is to have a bunch of people playing by the old rules, not realizing they no longer exist. By the time they figure it out, the boss has achieved his goals, and the employee can be replaced by someone else who hasn’t figured it out yet.

So what is a meaningless cog to do?

The way we see it, you really only have 3 options.

1) Keep banging your head into the wall expecting the old rules of the American dream to suddenly re-emerge. (Good luck with that approach)
2) Become one of the cold, calculating people that can rise to the top of the current system.
3) Spend your time making the people that do rise to the top as miserable as humanly possible.

More and more meaningless cogs want to opt for option #3 simply because option #1 doesn’t work, and option #2 is really rolling the dice with a potential afterlife destination.

Unfortunately, Option #3 is quite the high wire act. The level of difficulty has scared off more than a few employees. Everyone makes the same mistake. They look down. Don't look down. It's just a high wire. You can walk across that thing. You've done it a million times without even realizing it.

If you can implement a very sophisticated passive-aggressive arsenal, and you can manage to keep a straight face amidst a simmering red-faced boss—-buckle up for a high unlike any high you’ve (legally) experienced before.

Your good friends at Half Empty are here to help you develop some strategies, and overcome your fears. Come on out on the high wire. There's room for all of us.

Who should you target?

While it sure would be great to target your company’s CEO…he’s beyond your reach. If you go on the high wire outside his ivory tower, he'll just push you off. He does that sort of thing for fun. And when you fall from that kind of a height, you may never recover.

The local boss, however, is fair game. He has chosen Option #2 because he wants to become one of those untouchable guys in the ivory tower. It’s his goal. His weakness is that he isn't there yet...and his high wire is only a few feet off the ground.


How do you target him or her?

Here are a few hints to make your day more fun.

*Praise his rivals

Are there other Vice Presidents at the company on the same level as your boss? Start praising them every chance you get. Here are a few sample options. Feel free to customize them for your use.
1) “Boy that Dick Smith sure knows how to maximize those revenues. They must love him at corporate headquarters.”
2) “Have you seen Dick Smith’s house? Wow! Now, that’s a palace.”
3) “I was just talking to Gladys in Dick Smith’s department. I can’t believe the CEO calls him so often just to say hello.”

See how this works? You can’t possibly be fired for talking up another VP. You’re all on the same team, remember? You aren’t criticizing your boss—you’re complimenting a valued co-worker. How petty can your boss get? I sure hope Dick Smith or his good friend the CEO don’t hear about this firing.

*Call every woman in the office by his ex-wife’s name

And slap your head every time. “Sorry—I don’t know what is wrong with me. I apologize.” What if he doesn’t have an ex-wife? Please. They all have ex-wives. If by some miracle they don’t, then use the name of his secret mistress. (C’mon—that’s common office gossip knowledge, isn’t it?) If you’re worried about offending the other women in the office, simply tell them what you’re doing. You’ll probably find that they'll happily allow you to call them “Myrna,” once they know why. They’ve been looking for a way to enact Option #3 themselves. It’s win-win.

*Live up to the letter of the most ridiculous office policies

If you work in any industry that requires certain safety procedures, you’re golden. You know they don’t really want you to follow those rules—they just created them to legally cover their butts. See what happens when you really do it. If you don’t work in an industry like that, you still have options. Have your employee handbook on your person at all times, and open it to the page in question when the boss violates nitpicky company rules (“Hmmm, now where is that inappropriate office language section? Hmmm, now where did I read that part about personal phone calls? Hmmm, now where is that section about using the postage meter for personal correspondence?”)

*Baked goods

In a corporate environment there is always one or two suck ups that buy baked goods for the office. Somehow they think spending $4.70 on a dozen donuts will get them that big promotion. Use this to your advantage. Find out which donut your boss likes best and grab it before he does. Make sure you tell the suck up how delicious that pastry was within ear shot of the boss. He can't fire you for eating a strawberry bismark, now can he?

*Parking debris

If you work for one of those companies that reward their incompetent middle management with special parking spaces, you're in luck. Simply leave debris in their space before they arrive. Since, most of these schlubs don't get in until 10:00 AM this shouldn't be too difficult. Broken bottles, dead cats and hobos work best.

*Fake voicemails

In most offices there is one guy that can do a spot on impersonation of the CEO. Have him leave your boss a bogus voicemail at 4:40 on Friday afternoon. Somethinglike, "I'll need that Billingley report first thing Monday morning, and it better be complete". Your boss will spend the whole weekend trying to figure out who Billingsley is.



Think about it. How will your boss' boss react when he fires you for following or enforcing company rules?

Those are just a few to get you started.

If you’re a fellow Option #3er, we’d love to hear some of your suggestions, too. Send them via e-mail (anonymously is fine), and we’ll feature some of your ideas in a later column.

Remember, if you’re going to get fired anyway, you might as well get fired for something ridiculous like being too complimentary of coworkers, or being too much of a stickler for enforcing corporate rules.

That's the new American dream.








If you really want to see these techniques taken to their logical extreme, you’ll want to pick up a copy of Rick’s novel at www.encpress.com. The lead character (Zagorski) is the all-time king of the passive-aggressive irritators.

"GRIEVING FOR YOUR HAIR LOSS, STAGE 2 (Anger)"

By Dave Stern (with Rick Kaempfer)




By now, scientists and psychologists all seem to agree with Elizabeth Kubler Ross’ five stages of grieving: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

For some reason, however, nobody has ever applied these five stages to men with male pattern baldness. We’re also losing something close to us that has been a part of our lives forever…our hair. But does society, or science, or psychology care about us?

No.

That’s why we’re going to spend 2007 dedicating one column a month to helping balding men through the stages of grieving. This month we’re focusing on Stage 2 Anger, first apologizing for those who have displayed this bald anger before, then beginning to offer some tips on where the Stage 2 man should direct his anger.


Why are you so upset?

“I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore”
--Peter Finch, “Network”

Fullheads always ask bald people why we’re so upset about going bald. The following is a typical exchange.

Bald: “I can’t believe I’m losing my hair.”
Fullhead: “Oh get over it. What’s the big deal?”
Bald: “Get over it? GET over it? GET OVER it? GET OVER IT?”
Fullhead: “Calm down. It’s not that big of a deal. You look fine.”
Bald: “Not a big deal? Give me your heart.”
Fullhead: “What?”
Bald: “Give your damn heart. Come here. I’m going to rip that heart right out of your body. It’s not that big of a deal. It’s only been a part of your body since birth and it’s going to be taken away for no good reason.”
Fullhead: “Get away from me, man.”
Bald: “Give me your heart. I’m going to rip it out of your body and show it to you as a constant reminder of what you used to have.”
Fullhead: “Let go weirdo.”
Bald: “I…want…that….heart.”
Fullhead: “Heeey. That hurts, stop it.”
Bald: “It’s not…that big…of…a deal. (Riiiiip)
Fullhead: Aaaeeeeeaaaaah!
Bald: “Calm down. It’s not that big of a deal. You look fine.”

Historical Anger

For all of the incredible achievements of bald people, we have had a few bad moments. Stage Two-ers have a tendency to get a little irritable, and sometimes act out in inappropriate ways. We’re betting that even Gandhi had a few of these moments while he was going through Stage Two. It’s probably best to acknowledge the most egregious examples of inappropriate anger right now and get past it, so we can move on to more constructive ways of displaying your anger today.


The Romans

OK, we’ll admit that the Romans had a bit of a balding problem. Virtually all of their emperors were losing their hair, and that might have led to a cranky outburst or two. There was that whole throwing the Christians to the lions thing, and Nero’s burning of the entire city, and the attempted take over of the world thing, but let’s face it, life was no picnic for Roman Emperors. Julius Caesar, for instance, was quite literally stabbed in the back by Fullheads Brutus and Cassius. That sort of behavior has a tendency to cause anger too. We’re not excusing the Emperor’s behavior, just identifying the cause of it. The Roman Emperors were Stage Two-ers looking for a little compassion. If they had gotten it, everything would have been fine.

The Crusades

OK, King Richard of England did lead the bloody crusades to the Holy Land leaving death and destruction in his wake. But did you know that King Richard was a balding man? Does anyone ever take the pain he must have been enduring into account? No.

He fits the profile of a Stage Two-er so perfectly. First, he wanted to get as far away (Isolation) as he could possibly go. Then after he got away and his problem didn’t go away (balding head), he reached Stage Two. Instead of celebrating King Richard as a man who was evolving through the stages of hair loss grieving, most of the world considers him a mass murderer. You can call his critics whatever you want. We call them “small minded.”

The Great Explorers

OK, despite the glowing reviews we gave them last month, we’ll admit that the Great Explorers during the 15th and 16th centuries had their faults too. Yes, Christopher Columbus and his men allegedly raped and killed thousands of natives when they landed on the island that is now Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Yes, Pizarro allegedly had natives of Peru torn apart by dogs if they didn’t accept Jesus as their savior. Yes, Sir Francis Drake was a slave trader, who built his fortune by harvesting human flesh. Yes, Captain Cook’s exploits in Hawaii make him a hated figure there amongst the natives to this day. But they were hurting inside. And nobody cared.


Victorian England

The English of the 19th Century were notoriously balding. Nearly every politician and statesman from the era grew a gigantic beard to offset his balding head while in Stage One, and when he reached Stage Two, he and his fellow Stage Two-ers had a tendency to try and colonize the entire world. One classic Stage Two-er took out his anger on his own people instead.

Ebenezer Scrooge never killed anyone, but the miserly man let his countrymen starve by giving them juice loans and then foreclosing on their properties when they couldn’t pay him. His anger was so intense he even made his Fullhead employee Bob Cratchitt work on Christmas. But did anyone ever try to understand the source of Ebenezer’s anger? No.



Who should you hate during Stage 2?

The easy answer is: everyone. The more educated answer is: there are some great historical targets.

A Picture is worth a Thousand Tears

Until the late nineteenth century, photography was a very expensive hobby that only boasted the very rich as its devotees. There were large segments of the population that had never seen a camera, let alone owned one. However, in 1888 a jerk named George Eastman decided it was time to perfect a camera that could be marketed to the masses.

If he had never been born, there would be few, if any pictures of you with hair. You would be forever spared the gut wrenching pain of stumbling upon a photo from your youth. There would be no lonely afternoons gazing longingly at the worn and tattered photos of your long gone hair. There would have been no time wasted gently stroking and gingerly kissing those old photos. Think of what our people could have accomplished.

If you’re going to hate…and you are…it’s part of Stage 2, my friend…spend a little bit of time hating George Eastman.

Keeping them in the Dark

The Middle Ages were a time of much joy and happiness for our people. Fullheads were dying in droves and we were generally left alone. Living with disease-carrying rats really wasn’t all that bad. Also, let’s not forget that the Middle Ages were also called the “DARK Ages.” Whereas, historians generally agree that the Dark Ages ended in 1400 we feel they concluded much later.

In 1880 Thomas Edison and Joseph Swan teamed up and produced the first practical light bulb. Until that time, light bulbs would burn out too quickly or set the town on fire. After news of their invention spread, everyone had to have electric light in their homes. You know how fads are.

Simpletons often ask, “Weren’t candles and gas lights used before Edison?” Yes, they were and we didn’t like them much either. However, candles and gas lights didn’t produce the same illumination as the light bulb. In fact, some of the shadows these lights produced actually made us look like we had more hair.

If you’re going to hate…and you are…it’s part of Stage 2, my friend…spend a little bit of time hating Thomas Edison.


WTF are you looking at?

It’s generally accepted that the Chinese first developed eyeglasses sometime before the thirteenth century. However, the Chinese version was quite cumbersome, and eyeglasses didn’t gain widespread popularity until the 18th century. That’s when a London optician named Edward Scarlett devised the rigid side arms that rest atop the ears. His invention allowed the popularity of eyeglass to soar.

Before 1730, our people were having their way with farsighted women left and right. We were “enjoying the company” of gals with astigmatisms almost at will. This Scarlett guy comes along and reduces our chances by about eighty percent. Thanks a lot fella. Thankfully, no Fullhead has found a cure for many forms of blindness yet.

If you’re going to hate…and you are…it’s part of Stage 2, my friend…spend a little bit of time hating Edward Scarlett.

Living in the past, hating for the future

Let us reiterate that your time in Anger and Rage is fleeting. Use this guide as a sort of beginner’s syllabus for hate. Please keep in mind that George Eastman, Thomas Edison, and Edward Scarlett, are just a few of the historical figures that deserve our fury. Remember, there’s a limitless supply of graves that need to be defaced and you don’t have much time. Don’t forget the middle of the night crank phone calls to their descendants either.