Now, that's a bra!

A St. Petersburg, Florida woman was spared serious injury when the strap of her "cheap" bra slowed down a .45 caliber bullet that was fired in her direction. We at DOUI are of course very happy for this woman's safety (and hope she casts a vote for us in the upcoming Bloggies). We are also, already imagining the repurcussions:

*********
[Bra commercial - A 20's something woman stands in her front yard, wearing a thin, tight sweater]

Woman: I love my new Playtex Cheapo! The metal underwire offers me real lift and support [Close up of bosom, well lifted and supported], the fabric is soft and breathable [Shot of several men, watching woman's bosom, sighing in unison], and the straps are great protection in my rough neighborhood!

[Shot of mugger running by. He fires gun at woman, twice. Woman throws each shoulder and corresponding breast forward in quick motion. Sparks fly off of bra straps as bullets are deflected. Pan to men watching woman, one of whom is lying on the ground, dead from a gunshot wound. The other men are watching him.]

Man: [weeping] That's just how Joe would've wanted to go.

**********
[Dirty Harry remake. Harry has caught up to criminal and is now pointing his .44 caliber revolver at him. The criminal's automatic pistol is lying nearby, the criminal eyeing it nervously.]

Harry: I know what you're thinking. "Did he fire six shots or only five?" Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kind of lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself a question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?

Punk: [Smiling] Actually, it don't matter! [Rips off shirt, revealing bra underneath]

Harry: Damn!! [Shoots punk, but the bullet is deflected by the bra-strap. Punk grabs gun and shoots Harry twelve more times than is possible with the cartridge in his gun.]

Just a Reminder...We Want Your Vote!

Your vote for "Most Humorous Blog" that is in the 2007 Bloggies! Voting ends Wednesday evening and we appreciate your support. We also appreciate your readership, and any money that you might have spent if we can really cool stuff like DOUI t-shirts and golf caps. All we can offer now is DOUI air... but it's really funny air, promise.

Hmmm... that doesn't read nearly as well as I thought it would.

Critically Panned

I was perusing the MSNBC website when I came across one of those "Worst of" lists of songs for 2006. Now, this is the end of year staple of news outlets, where they routinely assign cheesy, inexperienced writers, hoping that they'll burn off a bit of excess vitriol, clichés, and pap writing. Also, it's very difficult to blow this kind of gig, as the entertainment world puts out crap faster than diarrheic cattle. Well, Helen A. S. Popkin managed to blow it splendedly, no pun intended.

I wasn't surprised to find narcissistic offal like Fergie's "Fergalicious" or Justin Timberlake's "SexyBack" on the list. These are easy calls, deserving of a critical review otherwise found in a Spinal Tap film. The titles alone beg to be splattered with verbal abuse. Rod McKuen would have been ashamed to pen them.

However, James Blunt? The Fray? Evanescence? Clearly Ms. Popkin is too busy listening to selections from her Ashley Simpson and Britney Spears collection to develop a sense of taste, that is when she's not busy cultivating the kind of inadequate, yet pompous style that only a writer with two names and two intials could manage. Either that or she wrote those selections as stoned as Blunt describes himself being in one of the songs in question.

Let's examine her "analysis" of a few of these songs. She refers to Blunt's song as "a creepy stalker’s serenade" which might give Sting a bit of comfort, given that is exactly the vibe he and the rest of The Police were gunning for with their classic "Every Breath You Take." Perhaps, Ms. Popkin hasn't heard of dramatic narrative in music? Perhaps she's not heard of The Police? Perhaps she's not also heard of the words "talent" or "ability" as she also unthinkingly describes Blunt's gritty but soaring voice as "scary." I'll bet she just swoons to Bryan Adams, Bruce Springsteen, and Bob Dylan though. Oh, all right, I'll bet she swoons to Snoop Dogg and Tone Loc classics.

She seems to have a point of envy as far as the voices are concerned, because she goes on to spend almost the entire section on the Evanescence song "Call Me When You're Sober" criticising Amy Lee's remarkable voice. It makes you wonder whether Popkin has listened to an Evanescence record longer than it takes to drown out her wind in the loo. That's no less a charitable guess than Popkin makes in her comments though, describing Lee as "that one girl from school who was absolutely certain she could sing, but really the only thing going for her was a powerful set of pipes capable of blotting out all other sound on the choral risers?" What a clueless, musically-illiterate git. She must have had a miserable high school experience.

Finally, Popkin mirthlessly describes the title track from the Fray's How to Save a Life as "a stultifying combination of sappy piano melody and laughably serious lyrics jammed into a standard pop structure. This over-played tune is enough to make you wish you’d never been born." Funny that; replace the words "piano melody" with "verbal riff" and "lyrics" with "criticism" and I'd say the same thing about Popkin's description of the Fray's song, only I'd add the word "rubbish." Except I have more pride than that.

Oh, and don't get me started about the self-consciously hip review of the Worst Films of 2006 by Dave White on the same site. I almost spit up my Bass ale this evening whilst reading his line about making a "film geek joke" simply because he managed to name drop Bresson. (I myself was watching Jancso last night, The Red and the White if you must know. God bless the people at Netflix. Chytilová's Daisies is next, if I remember my queue correctly. How's that for film geekdom?)

At least White gets the films right, to his great credit, and I must admit I enjoyed his on-target bit on The DaVinci Code. That about evens it out in my opinion. I'm perfectly willing to overlook self-conscious, blisteringly mean, pop-writing if the details are all in order.

A New Year's Resolve!

Well, it's time to engage in the most famous of all New Year's traditions. No, I'm not writing of drinking until your head turns soft as a sponge, although I have heard tell that occasional correspondent Lukas P. Short had to be pulled out of a hay-baling machine yesterday after too many bottles of bourbon and grassoline. Apparently, he was wearing nothing but his elaborately decorated Stetson, and that was before he went into the baler. (Are you listening Arianna?)

No, I'm speaking of the New Year's Resolution, that time-honoured, painstaking process of examining the failed, pathetic limitations of one's life and setting higher, nobler standards for the upcoming year.

Riiii-ght. The actual practise goes more like this:

"Hello, me. What would you really like to do this year that would make your life a bit better than last year? Lose a bit of weight? Get fitter? Write a second novel? Right, I'll just jot that down and file it away with this used tissue paper. Well done!"

Of course, many of us are a bit more ambitious. So, whereas, last year, I jotted down the resolutions of a variety of people, for legal purposes I'm keeping to myself this year. What follows are then are my, Earl Fando's, resolutions for 2007. I think it will be a grand year.

**********

Earl Fando's 2007 New Year's Resolutions - Silly Version

• Beat Stew in golf at least twice
• Get my novel published by an actual publisher
• Get book jacket comments for the novel from the following: Michael Palin, John Cleese, Mike J. Nelson, Henry Kissenger, Bob Woodward, Paul McCartney, Cher, Waylon Flowers and Madame, and Andy Kaufman (if possible)
• Run the New York Marathon Naked (again)
• Ride in the Kentucky Derby backwards
• Prank phone call Bill Clinton pretending to be Monica Lewinsky
• Prank phone call George W. Bush pretending to be Karl Rove
• Get on a blog where the other participants post once in awhile (Sorry, this is from the "bitter" list of New Year Resolutions)
• Dance with Bono during a U2 concert (the Funky Chicken)
• Eat 10 pounds of Wensleydale cheese - not necessarily at one sitting
• Get restraining orders from Keira Knightley, Cameron Diaz, and Paul Harvey lifted
• Stowaway on Space Shuttle - Pop out and yell "surprise" during Earth - shuttle communications linkup
• Score winning goal in Arsenal-Spurs derby match - lift up team strip, revealing undershirt with DOUI advert and mustard stains
• Serve as seat-warmer during Oscars, live-blog during show about how warm Oprah's bum must be judging from her seat
• Invent a self-folding lawn chair
• Translate Much Ado About Nothing into Cornish
• Take Mrs. Fando to Ireland for 15th anniversary (no, really)
• Attend U.S. State of the Union address - repeatedly shout "Damn straight!" after presidential remarks
• Develop abs of steel - crush beer cans with stomach
• Arm wrestle David Cameron and Tony Blair
• Win Powerball and blog for a living

One More Vote to Cast

The 2007 Bloggies nomination process is underway and we'd very much appreciate any nominations you'd care to make for the site.

The address is http://2007.bloggies.com/

We'd especially appreciate any nominations in the Most Humorous Blog category, but pretty much anything would make our day, given the general malaise around here.

Thanks, and don't forget to mail Earl (me) with your vote for Best DOUI Post for 2006, as well.

Happy, Happy, New, New, Two, Two

Well, a very Happy New Year to you all! Now that all of our partying is over (Stew, you can put away the bottle of Fresca and the bag of Cheetos...try not to get orange all over the desk, will you?) it's back to the usual business at this time of year.

No, not simply making up crap for our and hopefully your amusement, though that is our goal most of the year. No, the second anniversary of the founding of DOUI is coming up on the twentieth of the month.

As is our short lived tradition, we'll be picking the best (which means the silliest) of the previous year and posting appropriate links to those when the glorious day comes around.

YOU CAN HELP!

We'd like you to participate as well. Just send in your favorite DOUI post of the year to Earl's address (earlfando@yahoo.com) and we'll compile those votes (all 3 of them!) and announce the winner as part of our mammoth celebration (Are you ready for your close-up Ms. Diaz?)

In the meantime, we'll continue to do that crap posting thing as well, just to get this year off to a bright start. Thanks for your support!

Cheers,

Earl.