...and I cannot lie, except in cases of self-preservation where I might choose to conceal my affinity

Source: Athens Banner-Herald

Science tackles the pressing issues of our time, this time regarding whether you should fart on planes

Their conclusion: it's better for pilots to fart than not fart.  For safety!  Seriously, this is a thing people are studying, right now.  They probably earn more than you do!

A team of Danish and British gastroenterologists produced a paper on flatulence on planes after one of them, Jacob Rosenberg, was inspired on a flight between Copenhagen and Tokyo.

The problem is that farting is an invariable consequence of digestion and people do it about 10 times a day.

Was there a need for that Wikipedia link?  Pretty sure people have figured out what that word means.

Hans Christian Pommergaard, Jakob Burcharth, Anders Fischer, William Thomas and Professor Rosenberg have told the New Zealand Medical Journal the holding back option may seem "alluring'' but there are drawbacks.

"Alluring" is not the word I'd have picked.  Maybe "painful" or "excruciating"?

Stress, discomfort, pain, bloating, dyspepsia and other symptoms could ensue, while not discounting the chance that all the effort may be sabotaged by turbulence in any case.

CAPTAIN: Please be advised that we are encountering some turbulence.

EVERYONE ON PLANE: <releases pent-up farts>

"There is actually only one reasonable solution ... just let it go,'' the medicos say.

They warn of consequences in the cockpit.

"If the pilot restrains a fart, all the drawbacks previously mentioned, including diminished concentration, may affect his abilities to control the airplane,'' the researchers say.

"If he lets go of the fart his co-pilot may be affected by its odour, which again reduces safety on board the flight.''

Yes, smelling a fart is in fact a serious safety concern on planes now.  Can't wait til the TSA gets involved.

The specialists did not recommend setting farts alight, either on land or in a plane, despite its proven ability to reduce odour.

Were people previously trying to do this on planes?  Everyone knows the best method is to shift blame to others by peering around in an obvious manner after you fart, to make it seem like you're trying to find the real culprit.  Also acceptable: asking if someone just stepped on a duck.

They reluctantly dismissed the notion of rubber pants with an attached air container for collecting gas as "somewhat extreme''.

I'd hate to see the options that were deemed "way too extreme", given that the "somewhat extreme" option already sounds like some sort of bizarre BDSM equipment.

But they reckon putting active charcoal in passenger seats is a winner of an idea that could be backed up with special undies.

Pre-flight passenger methane breath tests and reducing fibre in airline food options were also considered.

"I'm sorry, sir, but you can't board.  According to this highly scientific breath test, your toots are a safety risk."  

 

To close this article out, the writers have provided a dubiously helpful list of travel tips:

• There are roughly two types of fart - silent, also known as sneaking, and loud.
• The average person farts about 10 times a day.
• Women's farts smell way worse than men's.
• Sulphur containing gasses are responsible for the pong.
• Burning the gas does reduce the smell but lighting farts is not recommended on land or in a plane.
• Exercising the pelvic ring is essential to maintain the ability to fart silently.
• For people with a weak pelvic floor, decoys can be performed such as coughing, sneezing, verbal outbreaks or spontaneous applause.

Holy shit, that last tip is phenomenal.  You could try verbal outbreaks--your fellow passengers will have no idea you're farting!  They'll just think you have Tourette's.  Even better is the spontaneous applause option.  Ideally, nearby people will hear both the fart and the applause, and they'll think you're just super proud of your digestive system.  Thanks, science!

Paul McNamara is easily amused by jokes about butts

Paul McNamara of Network World has discovered browser plugins.

Specifically, he has found this plugin:

It's a browser plug-in for Chrome, Safari or Firefox -- posted to Github by someone going by the name panicsteve -- that simply replaces every reference to "the cloud" on a webpage with the words "my butt."

Hilarity ensues.

Quite.

Now I say hilarity ensues despite the fact that I wasn't willing to install the extension myself. As Rick Harrison of Pawn Stars fame might say, it's not that I don't trust panicsteve, it's that I don't trust anybody.

So you cracked yourself up just imagining what a webpage would look like with the words "my butt" on it?  That's kind of precious, actually.

And besides, you can achieve the same hilarious effect, 

Hilarity!

albeit nowhere near as elegantly, by using the find-and-replace function in Microsoft Word, which I did do

using a recent story written by Network World's in-house authority on all things cloud, senior writer Brandon Butler.

I hate to spoil the story for anyone, but I will tell you this: McNamara finds the result of his Word find/replace efforts to be just the most fucking hilarious thing ever.

The result was seven sentences in which the phrase "the cloud" was replaced by "my butt." Some of the sentences were funny.

Others not so much?  Guess you can't win 'em all, McNamara.

Some were way too funny.

And others, well ... After a few minutes of professional reflection - much of it spent starring at pictures of my kids

I decided I wasn't willing to actually publish the sentences here. Sorry, you'll have to do your own experiments.

So it was okay to tell us about the plugin that inserts the words "my butt" into articles, but actually showing us a nonsensical sentence where it's been done is going too far?

But, if you're willing to go that far for a cheap laugh, I suggest you try one better:

Something involving fart jokes?  They're like butt jokes, but improved!

Years ago - many years ago -

 someone suggested that I take any old Word document and do a find-and-replace on it swapping out every "the" and replacing it with "the f*****g."

A thousand times funnier than cloud-my-butt.

One thousand times the hilarity!  I wish I were as easily amused as you, good sir.