Four-ounce packages of Idahoan® Baby Reds® Mashed Potatoes state that when its contents are added to 2 cups of boiling water, the resulting mixture should provide 4 servings of potatoes. Last night I made 2 packages, and Mom and I ate it all in one sitting.

Now, I'm not typically one to complain about portion size, but I'm pretty sure that half a cup of instant potatoes isn't an adequate serving size. If such a small amount of rehydrated potatoes was a sufficient serving, no one would have ever heard of the Irish Potato Famine.

Product serving sizes are based on survey data from as much as 25 or 40 years ago. Back in the day, I guess Americans had a smaller appetite for artificially flavored and colored potato flakes. It's time to enter the democratic 21st century: one person, one packet.

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There isn't really any good way to report a suicide and put a positive or humorous spin on it. However, sometimes, such as with the self-inflicted death of racing legend Dick Trickle — the inspiration for the surname of Tom Cruise's character in Days of Thunder and longtime SportsCenter punchline — there's no way to avoid it.

"NASCAR drivers recall Dick Trickle as unique and fun," reported USAtoday.com yesterday.

I was never a very big NASCAR fan, but I always kept an eye out for Dick Trickle myself. Thanks for one last one for the road, Dick.

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In the past month, I've started receiving more and more spam through the Wriphe.com Contact form. I can't believe that a real person is actually taking the time to email little old me with spam for payday loans, 150mg tablets of viagra, and cheap generic levitra, so that's got to be an automated bot.

(What this spam is selling says a lot about who must be responding to it, don'tcha think? People who make bad financial decisions with limp dicks. Cause or effect?)

I've added a simple math problem to the contact form to try to screen out bots. I suspect that bots are better at math than most of the people I know, so we'll see how long that fix lasts.

I've also begun having friends tell me that they are having trouble with the site's captchas, preferring to email me or text me about blog posts rather than leave comments here. The captchas were last revised in January 2012, so maybe they've become a little outdated. To test that theory, I've changed the captchas associated with the comments fields effective immediately.

No matter how these comment and contact captcha changes turn out, I might have to revise them all to make it even harder for the bots. There must be some tipping point where the forms' difficulty of use discourages using the forms for their intended purpose. Just something else you can blame on the Internet: making it harder for people to communicate with one another since 1993.

Mom Posted May. 16, 2013 at 12:52:47 PM
I'm just here to try out the new tool.

Mom Posted May. 16, 2013 at 12:53:36 PM
I didn't see a math question last time or this time.

 Wriphe [Official Comment]: Posted May. 17, 2013 at 06:40:44 PM
The math question is only on the contact form. If you'd rather do math than solve captchas, I can probably make that happen. Or I can combine captchas AND math questions. That could be fun.

Ken Posted May. 20, 2013 at 03:42:25 AM
Just testing it out...if you see this then it worked!

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After 7 years, I have finally replaced my Batman tire cover. How many years will this one last?

DC Comics hasn't used this Milton Glaser designed "DC Bullet" for nearly a decade now, but it will always be the only DC logo for me.

Keith Posted May. 15, 2013 at 04:38:59 AM
I predict the new cover will last longer than the jeep will

Ken Posted May. 15, 2013 at 04:40:40 AM
Your DC tire cover looks amazing! Did you hand paint it? If so, wow! It looks flawless! Kudos!

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Today's headlines on The Weather Channel's Weather.com:

• "Locusts Could Wipe Nation Out"
  (a locust plague is consuming vegetation in Madagascar)
  
  
• "A Frightening FIRST for Mankind"
  (global carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has reached prehistoric levels)
  
  
• "Huge Rats Devour Gulf State"
  (invasive Argentinian swamp rats are destroying Louisiana wetlands)
  
  
• "What Happens Next is CHILLING"
  (a Russian woman crossing the street slips and is run over by a car)

Happy Mother's Apocalypse Day from The Weather Channel!

Other than that one story about ice cap-melting greenhouse gasses, what do those stories even have to do with the weather? Maybe it's time to rename the station "The Whatever Channel."

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