The Dictionary of Unfortunate Ideas

Seven Years!? It Only Seems Like Nine!

2012-01-23T01:21:00.000-06:00

It's a very happy 7th birthday to us! No, not US magazine, which only seems as though it were written by seven year olds. As of January 20th, the Dictionary of Unfortunate Ideas is seven years old.

The what you say? All right, I realize we've been pretty lax around here lately and 2011 was a quiet year for us. However, we're not out of business yet, assuming you think of this as a business. We've approached it more or less as a highly experimental effort in wasting people's time, just like network television!

So, just like on a network television show that's lasted seven years, I thought it would be a good time to reminisce about some of the more memorable moments in our illustrious history, resulting in many wavy, filtered flashbacks and sudden jarring, yet jolly cutaways to past moments of mirthful mayhem. Think of this as our clip show, only we don't actually have that many clips, as we mostly do written stuff.*

Why some of these moments seem like they only happened yesterday, or would've if we'd posted anything yesterday...

Remember our very first post? Who was Chico y Jose, anyway? He never turned up. I'm assuming his absence was golf-related.
It wasn't long after that when I instituted our longest running tradition - the annual review of Oscar Best Picture nominees. My thanks to the Academy for extending the nominee list from five to ten.
Then there was that time Stew became convinced that Star Wars and Titanic were all part of one, long cinematic continuum. It's still a pretty convincing argument, if you ask me.
We've been here so long, we were around before David Tennant cemented his financial future by becoming Dr. Who. Before that he played Casanova, where he did almost as much tongue-wagging as he did in the fourth Harry Potter film. No offense to David, but Elvis still would have done a better job, if you ask me.
Speaking of revisionist cinema, Stew has his own vision for this sort of thing, only with the Governator himself, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Then there was that time I was on Iron Chef, in Japan. Funny; I don't ever remember visiting Japan, and I never eat carrots.
Remember Jorge Carlito Viejo? Man, the people at La Raza do. I keep explaining that he's native Esperanto, but no one listens. Anyway, he does write a great script.
JCV is also an accomplished poet. In all honesty though, his work reads better in the original Latin.
I still don't know how Stew scored an interview with both J.K. Rowling AND Peter Jackson, but I do know that it is nerd heaven.
Then there was that running argument I had with the Friends of the National Zoo. I'm assuming that I won, since they never responded. Of course, I originally thought I was debating Henry Winkler.
I was saddened to learn of the death of Cheetah this year. I'm just glad I got to interview him before he passed on.
I also interviewed that guy from Viva Las Vegas (hint, hint)
I also broke the story on the lost Teletubby. Thank heavens they never found him.
Remember when Nuffy Noe (No relation to French arthouse pornographer Gaspar) launched his Five Times Better program? It changed the way I think about the number five.
Stew's research into the Man in Black was too late to make the Johnny Cash film, but it still resonates with prop comics.
Whatever happened to Linus Coconut, the man who used up our prize budget for the next 25,000 years?
We've also always been interested in Super Bowl Ads.
One day, Stew and I were discussing Frankenstein's Monster at lunch. Not only did it put us off the Mexican BBQ we were eating, but it inspired this post.
Speaking of Stew, he's done some great work with actresses in the past. (Dear Mrs. Miller, not that kind of work.)
One year we visited the International Hitler Impersonators Convention. Without these guys you wouldn't have all though great Downfall parodies.
This is also a good time to remind people of Nuffy Noe's fine work in music criticism.
Not many people remember, but it was this blog which first called attention to the anti-vegesectionist movement.
I'm sure everyone remembers that little disagreement I had with Nuffy a few years ago. It would all be water under the bridge now, if that troll hadn't attacked us.
A lot of people (nearly seven) have asked me why Stew isn't around so much these days. My answer is Stew's answer.
An actual clip for the clip show. Jorge Carlito Viejo is in it, and who doesn't recognized the beloved** Cakey the Clown.
Then there was that time I took up jogging. The funny thing is that I haven't given it up, yet. I could have run from New York to New Jersey by now (I'm assuming that's a long way).
2009 was a busy year for me. I traveled to Ireland and tied up a guy in Boston.
Don't forget the time I let the cat out of the bag about some of the world's biggest secrets. The cat, as usual, savaged me.
Speaking of savaging me, I had hernia surgery in 2010!
The whole Conan/Leno feud seems ages ago, but reading Nuffy's cogent, searing analysis brings it all back."

Good times, good times, and there's much more where that came from (just peruse the "Best of" list if you doubt me). Who knows what will happen in the next seven years, provided those wacky Mayans weren't on to something?

* Yes, yes, I know we do a best of post, and that will turn up in a few days. Just hush your belly-aching and play along, will you?
** In Estonia, French Guiana, and parts of Poughkeepsie.

That Was the Year That Was the Year That ... Well, You Get the Idea

2012-01-08T22:20:00.001-06:00

2011 is gone but the scars still remain. I feel them every time I sit down.

OK, actually it wasn't that bad a year, but there were some awful moments: The Japan earthquake and tsunami, tornadoes in Alabama and Missouri, and the 10th anniversary of 9/11.

On the other hand, Osama Bin Laden is now sleeping with the fishes (poor fishes!). So, there were some good moments, some bad moments, and some moments that would make for a typical Leonard Maltin film review.* Here are a few of the more peculiar.

Dictatorial Demises

It was a trifecta for dictators and terrorists pushing up daises this year. First, Osama Bin Laden met the U.S. Navy SEALS for the first and only time. As most people expected, this meeting ended with the SEALS filling various parts of Osama's body with hot lead. Then, they buried him at sea. This was so Americans don't have to travel to Pakistan to piss on Osama's grave. Now, all you have to do is take a leak in the ocean the next time you're at the beach, and depending on the currents, it will get to him sooner or later.

Next, Colonel Qaddafi (Qadafy, Khaddaffi, Que Daffy, Nut Job in the Robes, etc.) met his demise in the Libyan revolution. You knew a guy who was the undisputed dictator of his country but would only promote himself to "colonel" couldn't be all that smart. (Qaddafy: "General Amir, come in." Gen Amir: "Aren't you supposed to salute me?" Qaddafy: "What do you mean? I'm the leader of the freaking country." Amir: "But I outrank you." Qaddafy: "Oh, yeah? Well, I'm busting you down to private!" Amir: "I overrule you! Nice try, colonel.")

Qaddafy was known for his colorful and ridiculous assortment of robes. He might have escaped if he hadn't been slowed down by his wardrobe convoy.

Finally, the Big Kahuna of North Korea, Kim Jong Il, met his maker. This was great news for the average North Korean but terrible news for the jumpsuit industry, which expects to see sales drop by nearly 50%. Kim's reign is noted for economic destitution, concentration camps, massive famines leading to rampant cannibalism, and a couple of so-so fox trots with Madeline Albright. He will be remembered by pretty much everyone as a gigantic, crap-weasel bastard. So, if that's what he was going for, he was a raging success.

In related news, They Might Be Giants released a song last year that could be the anthem for this motley collection of vicious losers:

The answer to that musical question? 2011!

If I were Assad in Syria, I'd be hoping this was one of those "happens in threes" things.

Wacked Weather

The weather was a bit freaky this year. The winter saw massive snowstorms including one that deposited two feet of snow not far from where I used to live, just 50 miles away. (We got 6-8 inches, to the great disappointment of the Littlest Fando.) Hint: I live several states south of Minnesota. Washington D.C. saw a massive two foot snowfall as well, the largest one since the 70's, which I witnessed personally. Yes, that's right. The snow follows me around and dumps on me every three decades. That's my theory.

The summer brought equally odd weather, including a high pressure ridge that dropped two weeks of 110+ temperatures to my town. It was like living and working in a sauna. I spilled water on a pile of rocks outside one day and they threw off a cloud of steam. It wasn't hot enough to actually cook an egg on the sidewalk, but you could easily warm up leftovers. For several days, we were hotter than Death Valley. That would sound great as a music review. As a weather report, it just made us want to throw eggs and water on the weathermen, to see if we could steam them into a giant omelet.

And this winter so far: gentle as a lamb. I'm hoping summer doesn't crack 95 F.

I Protest!

After a couple of years of conservative Tea Party protests, the other half decided to get in on the act, only with drums and bongs the size of drums. (This is so cops would confuse them with the drums, of course. However, after a few hits on the bongs, many of the protesters were sucking drum.) The protest was dubbed "Occupy Wall Street" but could have been more accurately named "Occupy a Park Near Wall Street."

The movement soon spread to other cities, because there are a lot of people out there who like drums and bongs.

The protestors complained about the "1%" and declared themselves members of the "99%," which confused the hell out of 99% of the population, who weren't protesting anything at the time.

Weinergate

I'm not going to belabor this, but how thankful are America's comics and humorists for a Congressional sex scandal involving a representative named "Weiner?" The thousands of jokes all wrote themselves. It was also difficult for people to take offense at the jokes because you could never tell if someone was specifically talking about Congressman Weiner or his little friend.

The only thing that could improve the story is if the congressman starts lobbying for Oscar Mayer.

Arab Spring or Indian Summer?

Revolution was in the air in North Africa and the Middle East in 2011. In addition to Libya, the longstanding authoritarian Egyptian President Mubarak lost power faster than an electric car on an out of town excursion. Another revolution changed the leadership of Tunisia, much to their surprise. In addition, numerous uprisings and protests occurred in several other countries, causing Arab dictators to panic like cats over a bathtub.

Officials in the West are hopeful that the previous governments will be replaced by democratic governments that respect civil liberties. However, these are the same officials who have long referred to the violent conflict between Palestinians and Israelis as the "peace process." This leads one to conclude that unicorns that fart rainbows might be a more reasonable prospect in the near run.

Somewhere, Bette Davis is muttering, "Fasten your seat belts. It's gong to be a bumpy night."

However, South Sudan became independent, so who knows?

Here's to a great 2012!

*Vis the Martin Short joke about Leonard Maltin: "There were some things about this film that I really liked, but there were some things about this film that I didn't like."

Happy Merry Christmas!

2011-12-25T00:01:00.006-06:00

Modern Christmas Carols

2011-12-24T00:23:00.003-06:00

It's that time of year again, and in-between prepping for 24 hours of A Christmas Story on TBS by trying not to shoot my eye out, I'm thinking about how so many Christmas carols are out of date.

Lest you think I've suddenly turned heathen, I'm referring to the purely secular ones. (I wouldn't change a word of the religious ones ...well, maybe a few dozen less "rum-pa-pum-pums" in "The Little Drummer Boy.") They were written in an earlier age and since then our language and culture have deteriorated faster than a Jerry Springer-hosted family reunion.

Consider "The Twelve Days of Christmas," for example. Okay, I admit "five golden rings" fits just fine these days, and I suspect G. Gordon Liddy and his friends at Rosland Capital can get you a bargain on those. However, "ten lords a leaping?" Obviously, the song is not being blasphemous, since there's only one Our Lord. So, it must be a reference to the House of Lords. Leaping, right? Have you seen most of those guys? Not only would their powdered wigs fly off like startled pigeons if they started bounding about*, but these grizzled old-timers would be in danger of pulling muscles they haven't used since Harold Macmillan was in power.**

What about "Deck the Halls?" First of all, the title sounds like what would happen if Mike Tyson ever ran into Rich and Anthony Michael Hall. The lyrics are something else. "Don we now our gay apparel?"An excerpt from Queer Eye for the Straight Guy? "Troll the ancient yule tide carol?" Does this mean we're supposed to sing the song under a bridge? Don't even get me started on the fa la la la la la la la las.

The youth of today need lyrics that contain references that are no older than six months old, or they'll seem "moldier than that cheese they put in salad dressing, whatever that's called." (Not an actual quote, but pretty true to life, if you ask me.)

So, it's clear some updating is in order for secular carols, if only so those kids from Jersey Shore won't hurt their tender little brains trying to work out words like "apparel," "yule," and " now," (never mind figuring out who Carol is). So, here are a few to try out the next time you go caroling.

The Twelve Days of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me,
A Lady Gaga CD.

On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me,
Two goalie gloves
and a Lady Gaga CD

(And so on, as follows)

Twelve Snookis dumbing
Eleven Yahoo!s hyping
Ten webcams peeping
Nine stars a dancing
Eight bankers bilking
Seven Losers slimming
Six Tebows praying
Five golden things (Because the dollar will collapse in a catastrophic cataclysm)
Four Angry Birds
Three Words with Friends
Two goalie gloves
and a Lady Gaga CD

Single Bells

Driving through the town
In a 200-horse Chevrolet
To all the bars we go
Drinking all the way (Chug, chug, chug!)
Bells on navel rings
Skinny jeans so tight
The puns we add to our pick-up lines
Make their boyfriends want to fight!

(chorus)
Single bells, single bells,
Single all the way.
Oh! how sad it is to ride
Alone 'til break of day.
Single bells, single bells,
Footloose, fancy free.
Oh! Maybe it's finally time for us
To try E-Harmony.

Caulkin' Around the Christmas Tree

Caulkin' around the Christmas tree
On a Christmas home repair show
Mistletoe hung with cool nail guns
Every ceiling fan must go.

Caulkin' around the Christmas tree,
Hang some dry wall up anew
Later we'll blow up a kitchen wall
To add a nice pass through.

You will get a temperamental
Feeling when you see
Your old bathroom crushed to bits,
By designers who think we're idiots.

Caulkin' around the Christmas tree,
Have a busy holiday
Driving a steamroller furiously
To flatten the whole mess away.

* Americans bounce, but Britons bound.
**For my fellow Americans, that's the same period that The Real McCoy's aired on television.***
*** For my fellow Americans who don't know anything about television, that's 1957-63.

Holiday Recovery

2011-11-28T00:45:00.002-06:00

If you've just spent the weekend doing both Thanksgiving dinner and Black Friday shopping, you're probably on life support right about now, reading this in-between feedings of non-turkey based saline solution and ice baths to numb the blisters you received bumping into angry mobs of people who didn't get one of the twelve 42" plasma HDTVs for $49.99 that your local electronics store put on display in a giant pit designed to funnel humans toward the center, the way an ant lion traps ants.

I'd feel sorry for you, but I slept until 10:00 a.m. on Friday, after having a splendid Thanksgiving meal at a relative's home the day before. We did take over some Mac 'n' cheese, and a simple Italian salad, so it wasn't all rest and relaxation, but it was mostly rest. In fact, I was so rested, I ran five miles before making the salad dressing, just to warm up for pouring the olive oil. The roads were remarkably empty.

I've never quite worked out what it is that drives people to fill their precious holiday hours by preparing a meal that "Dinner Impossible" chef Robert Irvine would declare beyond the bounds of normal Einsteinian space and time, followed by a midnight to seven AM mosh pit with hordes of people in a mood only slightly less congenial than the orcs in The Lord of the Rings, and only because they're afraid store security will take away the $29.99 XBox they managed to pry out of the hands of some blind nun on crutches.

It's commercialism run amok of course, and in poor economic times such as these, the specials and deals being offered by the nation's retailing giants are more tempting than usual. Normally, people would shove you over and stomp on your face to get past you to the Blu-ray shelves. This year, however, they're all wearing cleats and spiked heels, and that was just buying food the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving. Friday, people came out in battle armor that would make Maximus from Gladiator soil his toga.

So, with a busy work week ahead, just how does one recover from a long weekend of commercialized madness?

1. Accept the leftovers. They're there. They need to be eaten. Most importantly of all, they're already cooked. Make sandwiches. Dump turkey meat into your chicken soup for a little turducken flavor, minus the duck. Savor the unique flavor of cold mashed potatoes with a nice beverage. Use disposable forks and paper plates. Live the aftermath.

2. Skip Cyber Monday. No, I'm not just saying that so I'll get a bunch of good deals. I always buy my technology during the summer months, when tech people are offering all sorts of great deals to entice college students to blow up their credit cards like the villain at the end of a Japanese super hero TV show. No, the point is that you need rest and relaxation, and the enemy of those two goals is sitting in front of your PC, swearing like a cast member in a David Mamet play because your bank keeps blocking your debit card charges, all because you went just a little bonkers a few days ago. Plus, under those conditions, you are highly likely to break your PC, and then you'd have to buy a new one. A vicious cycle.

3. Watch a lot of sports. Sports are another holiday tradition, and over the next few days, there's Monday Night Football, college basketball, soccer, hockey, and loads of ESPN announcers drooling over the eventual return of the NBA (rumors are that ESPN may create a whole new network to broadcast coverage of the training camps and the after negotiation cigars and champagne). It's a good way to release pent up energy, because you won't be the one getting stomped on. Also, all the food commercials are for either restaurants, beer, or snack foods. No temptations to cook, with the exception of the occasional BBQ in a beer commercial.

4. Work hard. You'll need to, if you want to pay off everything you bought Friday. Seriously, did you need four dozen USB drives, just because they were $5 apiece? No. No, you did not.

Christmas is coming. You need to rest up, if only to mentally prepare yourself for all the crazies out there who haven't yet shopped enough.

Costuming Calamities

2011-10-30T22:20:00.179-05:00

Halloween approaches, bringing with it dark, unseemly images of terror - disturbing, cruel, frightening visions of the spectral, occult, and perverse - and that's just the costumes.

Costumes are a common theme at Halloween and one of the things we can learn from a close study of the holiday apparel of our peers is what to avoid. Here are some important tips for choosing your Halloween costume:

Don't drink and costume. Many people like to imbibe alcohol during Halloween (or any holiday, or for that matter any day they are conscious). However, you don't want to be under the influence until after you've chosen your costume. Otherwise you might make a mistake like this one:

Whoops! Sorry, that's just Lady Gaga out for a night on the town. She only dresses like she's drunk out of her mind. By the way, Gaga, Sally Field called and she wants her Flying Nun hat back.
Don't wear food. It's been years now since 9 and 1/2 Weeks came out and since then we've learned a great deal about food-borne pathogens, including the interesting fact that uncooked food in close proximity to the less hygienic parts of the human body is a quick recipe for projectile vomiting. Unless one of your friends is dressing as Linda Blair from The Exorcist, this sushi costume is a bad, bad idea.

Plus, where exactly do you put the wasabi and pickled ginger? Won't that sting just a bit?
Don't dress your kids as food. This is extremely creepy just by itself, but with the potential for an invasion of mindless, brain-dead, flesh-eating zombies growing ever more likely (judging from shows like Jersey Shore and Keeping up with the Kardashians) the last thing we want to do is to put our kids out there, dressed as appetizers.

Instead, stick to traditional cuddly, unappetizing Disney characters, or superheroes - just in case the zombies retain a vestige of human memory and decide it's not worth tackling Batman Jr. or Supergirl.
Fake muscles are pathetic. If you have to wear them, you're just telling everyone you don't have real muscles. Unless you're going for pity, scorn, or getting beat up by a bunch of young toughs dressed as characters from Twilight, skip this sad choice.

Additional advice: Skip dressing up as characters from Twilight, who are next up the scale to get beaten up (by young Harry Potter toughs).
Avoid mixing and matching. If you're going to go for a costume idea, try to keep it focused and uniform. Trying to meld two different concepts together only dilutes them both. You can't be both Spock and a Werewolf, or Harry Potter and Donald Trump, or Liberace and Dracula:

Sure it's frightening, but at what terrible cost to the wearer's psyche?
Size matters. No, we're not referring to costumes involving public nudity or dressing up as body parts. (Reminder: Even in our current libertine society, it is highly offensive to dress as Steven Tyler's or Mick Jagger's lips.) Rather, we want to remind you that articles of clothing should be the correct size for the character. Sure, if you're doing Chaplin you need shoes that are too big, or if you're dressing as a vapid, reality show character, you need a bathing suit three sizes too small. However, for most costumes the appropriate size will keep you from looking like - regardless of how cute you may be otherwise - a dork.
Finally, speaking of dorks:

This demonstrates that common sense remains the most fundamental necessity in making a costume choice. Otherwise, you too may wind up looking like a big gas bag that people want to sit on.

Happy Halloween!

To Boldly Go Back Where No Man Has Gone Before

2011-10-27T07:45:00.001-05:00

A few weeks ago, my blog compatriot Nuffy Noe informed me that the remastered and high-definition Star Trek: The Original Series is on Netflix. After turning cartwheels on the table (and to Nuffy's dismay, upsetting his bowl of Sopa del carnaval amargo del invierno), I settled down enough to finish the meal and realize I still had 9 hours to go before I could go home and watch an episode or twelve. Once I finally got in front of the home viewing screen, and after adding Vulcan ears and a blue shirt to my Wii avatar, I sat back in my Captain's chair and took in this new wonderment. Now, we get Netflix via our Wii, so I'm never completely certain that it's true high-definition. However,the episodes look so crisp and detailed, you could almost peel the base makeup off of Leonard Nimoy's face.*

I grew up in a world where television viewers were at the mercy of semi-intelligent, apelike programming executives, with a fondness for variety shows based on the meager talents of pop acts and wannabe vaudevillians. In addition, through my entire childhood, 12 channels was the norm, and three to six of those were mildly entertaining static (less if Sesame Street or the Electric Company were on). So, it's a little disconcerting to have every single Star Trek episode at your fingertips, as available and willing as the talking computer on the Enterprise.

The first time I pulled it up it took me thirty minutes to decide which episode to play (The Doomsday Machine, of course).**

Having a giant slice of geek heaven at your disposal isn't without some drawbacks though.

The first oddity I noticed was the new special effects. The Enterprise leans into orbits like a motorcycle racer taking a hairpin curve. You can almost imagine Chekov and Sulu on the bridge shouting, "Whee!" as they circle the planet. When Commodore Decker makes off with the shuttlecraft in "Doomsday," instead of steadily making it's way out of the bay as though it were on a slightly rusty special effects chain left over from Sky King, it does a little dip as it zips out ("And I thank you!"). In "Balance of Terror" when the Romulans fire their energy weapon, instead of being a menacing ghostly white, it's a friendly mix of magenta and red. Who knew the Romulans were employing interior decorators as their weapons designers?***

It's not that the special effects are bad. They're actually pretty decent, especially compared to say, the average Nickelodeon sci-fi program (very low bar, I know). What's peculiar is that they haven't remastered all of the special effects. So, in one scene you get a fantastic shot of a highly detailed USS Enterprise fishtailing into orbit around a magnificent ringed planet, and in the next one you get one of the Enterprise's computer screen, displaying 23rd Century technology in all it's NBC, pre-Atari 2600 glory. You'd think they could at least CGI some decent videos into the various monitors on the bridge, instead of leftover photos from the last International Astronomers Union kegger.

Then there's the music and sound. It's way to easy to recognize what's new, because like everything else in our day and age, the producers determined that they could subtly improve the quality of those elements of the program by making them 10 times louder. In episodes with remastered title sequences, the swish of the Enterprise going by sounds like Bruce Lee whiffing on a roundhouse kick in one of his early Hong Kong action flicks. In season two and after, the title theme replaces the thrilling and mysterious sound of a small, balanced chorus of women with an obnoxious diva singing the familiar melody as though she were trying to break a wine glass with her voice.

Then there's the sheer detail of the images now. Because Star Trek was originally shot on film (35mm, if I'm not mistaken) there was always the prospect of releasing it in high definition. Now, viewers can see the ship, consoles, equipment, and colorful alien makeup with frightening clarity. The initial reaction: "Could they have toned down the green rouge on Spock, just a little? He looks like Herman Munster's kid brother!" Also, it's now apparent that what seemed to be complex electronic control panels were more likely rejected versions of Bally pinball consoles.

It's really a case of CGI in the wrong places. Instead of a souped up Enterprise, with everything but the Jaguar on the hood, we wouldn't mind seeing a few guide wires and glue lines on the models. That's the kind of nostalgia that fits a sci-fi series containing strained Vietnam analogies and planets with Nazis and gangsters perfectly. But that makeup? They should have spent their whole SFX budget there. They should have left the audio alone, period.****

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to decide whether to watch Kirk split into a good and evil version, watch him exchange psyches with a woman, or watch him turn into a false Native American deity in space. So many choices!

* Alternate joke - You can almost count the straps on William Shatner's girdle.
** I had exactly the same response to Monty Python's Flying Circus, only funnier.
*** Now if only they'd let them work on the actual Romulan interiors.
**** With one exception: the episode where the ancient Vulcan hero yells, "Spock!" as he's being tortured. Some reverb would make that perfect.

Did You Ever Wonder Why Some People Are So Grumpy?

2011-09-28T00:19:00.003-05:00

Andy Rooney is retiring from 60 Minutes on Sunday. It's arguable that he retired years ago and CBS has just been videotaping him in his den, griping about whatever happened to be on his mind when he woke up from his afternoon nap. Still, whether in his den, his home office, or a Burbank studio designed to look like the workplace of a very cranky librarian who's just a few volumes short of signing up for next season's Hoarders, Andy could do one thing with alarming alacrity: complain the crap out of any given subject in Western civilization.*

Yes, it's true that he didn't complain all the time. It just felt that way. He was blessed with the build of great complainer: impenetrably thick eyebrows, hovering caterpillar-like atop eternally sad sack eyes; the steely demeanor of a senior citizen who's just seen the Blue Plate Special at their favorite restaurant go up for the first time in five years; a mouth so flat and expressionless that a ventriloquist would kill their dummy for it, and impatiently folded hands with fingers thick enough to strangle a full-grown moose.

I feel bad for the guy sometimes. Let's face it, where ever he goes, people are sure to assume he's in a bad mood. I'm guessing he doesn't get a lot of "Good afternoon, Mr. Rooney!" More likely it's exasperated queries of "What's bugging you today, Andy?" or impatient pleas of "Don't even start with me, Rooney," with a dab of the occasional sarcastic "Mornin' Sunshine!" He's the kind of guy who could deliver a short toast at a wedding, sincerely end it with "and I wish you both happiness and a long life together," and still have the bride flee from the room in tears, with her groom trailing her and shouting accusingly at Andy, "What the hell is wrong with you?"

This limited him as far as television went. He wasn't exactly going to turn up on the morning shows, chatting amiably with the cast of The View. A few moments opining about the general vapidity of morning television, and the cult of celebrity, not to mention the appalling decor, would have Joy Behar and Elisabeth Hasselbeck joining together in a blood oath to slay him.

I've often wondered just what he does for a living. Complaining three minutes a week can't possibly bring decent money in, not even in the bat-crap insane financial world of network television.** Reportedly, Rooney writes a column for a Tribune Media Services. I've never read it, but I suspect these days it consists of whatever made him the most irritable that day. While it's what his readers would expect, I can't imagine a newspaper syndicate actually shelling out massive amounts of cash for Andy's extemporaneous thoughts.Still, Larry King had a column in USA Today that consisted more or less of his slightly filtered thoughts in any given five minute period of time. Perhaps automatic writing is making a comeback?

The most recognizable words from Rooney were "Did you ever...?" This was almost invariably followed a 180-second litany of gripes, moans, and slightly irritable blathering about everything from sports to shopping to religion. Whatever he had to talk about in segments, he was clearly not happy about it and you weren't about to disabuse him of the idea that he was not happy about it, you cheerful punk.

After 33 years, it's a routine that's more than a little over familiar. With the exception of the occasional controversial remarks, Andy was a predictably East Coast, secular, establishment curmudgeon. His audience was getting as tired as Andy himself looked.

Part of me always secretly hoped he'd come in to work one day, temporarily off his rocker (well, more so that usual), to spectacularly break up the monotony:

"Did you ever wonder about flying seahorses? How'd they get up there in the air and why won't they stop talking to me in Esperanto? I don't speak Esperanto. No one does, not even in Atlantis. And what about those top hats they wear? Why don't they fall off when the seahorses do loop the loops through the slats of my rocking chair? ****ing orange bastards! Leave my chair alone!!"

Well, perhaps it will be this Sunday. The guy's getting on in years so maybe he'll go out with a bang.

* It's even inspired a game (sort of).
** If there is such a market for high-paying jobs involving short bursts of public grousing, please e-mail me. I have a great deal of amateur experience.

We're terribly sorry...

2011-09-01T23:10:00.000-05:00

... there were no August posts at all. That is a first, missing an entire month.

I blame the London rioters.

We'll Get You Out of a Taxing Situation!

2011-07-25T22:04:00.089-05:00

SCENE: INT. The office of a financial advisor. The advisor, a husky, bearded man stands in front of an imposing looking bookcase full of books on tax law. Insistent, slightly tense music in the background.

TAX ADVISOR, PATRICK SOCKS: Are you being audited? Do you have several years of unfiled tax returns? Is the IRS sending you threatening letters or coming to your home or place of business? ...Face it. You're screwed. You're never gonna get out of that deep, dark hole you've dug for yourself and Uncle Sam is about to start filling it in with cement.

That's why you need us!

Hello, I'm Patrick Socks, founder and owner of Tax Bastards. We help poor, unfortunate idiots like you to escape the crushing psychological weight of tax evasion, and we make it fun! We can provide you with a variety of services:

(Picture of Patrick Socks on the beach in Rio de Janiero, sipping a cocktail)

Escape: We can quickly get you one-way airplane tickets, to the scenic destination of your choice. We'll get you a visa, a place of residence, and a variety of personal identity documents from hard to verify countries around the world. Uncle Sam can't nail you for tax evasion if you're a Belorussian living in Brazil under the name Ivan Upyoursirsovitch.

(Picture of an auction, with Patrick Socks holding an auctioneer's gavel)

Liquidation of personal assets: After you sign up with us, you'll transfer all your worldly possessions to us, which we will convert into liquid funds, via several avenues, such as auctions, estate sales, garage sales, flea markets, and PBS's popular program Antiques Roadshow.

(Picture of Patrick Socks with an antique, and a surprised look on his face, on Antiques Roadshow.)

Plastic Surgery: For those who are too patriotic to leave the good old U.S. of A., we can line you up with a variety of plastic surgeons who can alter your appearance. In fact, we can make you look like the celebrity of your choice. For example, who would suspect George Clooney of being a tax cheat?

(Cut to Patrick Socks, with an insert of George Clooney)

(Winking) Right, George?

(Picture of Patrick Socks in a traditional undertaker's suit and top hat)

Faked Death: Finally, if necessary, we can fake your death via a variety of accidents, disasters, and other unfortunate mishaps that couldn't possibly leave a trace of a body behind. We'll even stage a funeral for the benefit of those parasites at the IRS. If you're up for it, you can even attend and hear all the great things we've written for your eulogy. We can even stage fatal kidnappings with the body parts of your choice to be sent to authorities.

(Cut to Patrick Socks in office)

(Laughs) No, no, we won't force you to cut anything off. Our in-house scientists have perfected cloning!

So if you're in a tight spot, instead of giving in to the government, give us a call at Tax Bastards! We're a bastard when it comes to your taxes!

NARRATOR: Call Tax Bastards at 1-800-B-A-S-T-A-R-D. Call Now! Our operators are waiting to spirit you away! (Quickly) Void where prohibited by non-tax law.

What's with the Hair?

2011-07-18T00:44:00.002-05:00

Hair is weird stuff. It grows out of our head in various colors and thickness. It can be curly, wavy, or straight as a hypotenuse. It grows all over our bodies, but mostly on our heads, faces, underarms, and (ahem) nether regions.

Unmanaged, hair is pretty wild stuff. My own salt and pepper mane has a life of its own, especially in the humid conditions of summer. Whenever I'm asked by a hairstylist or barber if I want gel in my hair, I just run my hand through it and watch their eyes gape as it stands up on it's own like a field of parched cornstalks. If I let it grow out and walk outside after a summer rainstorm, I've got the Joker's hairstyle inside five minutes (circa the Cesar Romero era).

So, hairstyles are important, and they can make you look good or call into question your powers of judgment and sanity. Consider the following hairstyles and the central question they raise: Why?

Mohawk - Based on the traditional style of the eponymous Native American tribe, once it spoke to tradition and adventerousness. Today, it cries out, "Electric razor accident."
The Fauxhawk - This style, which incorporates the high middle of the Mohawk with the relatively conservative arrangement of hair elsewhere, is the stylistic equivalent of a suburban banker who spends the weekend dressed in leather and tooling around on his immaculatedly-financed Harley.
Bob - This hairstyle became popular with women in the 1920's and got it's name from the fact that it made ladies look like guys named Robert.
Combover - This hairstyle says, "I'm bald but I think you're too stupid to notice." Sorry, we're not.
Mullet - This hairstyle was obviously created by someone who cuts their own hair. "I've got the front and sides done, but I can't reach the back. Oh, well, screw it."
Ducktail - Presumably named for looking like the unkempt posterior of a mallard, this hairstyle is accomplished through the application of massive amounts of petroleum products. A great style for spelunking, as you can trim a bit off the top and create a handy torch.
Rat-tail - Continuing the animal-themed hairstyles, this one would have been more accurately named the Squirrel-tail, given that actual rat tails are balder than Vin Diesel.
Dreadlocks - The urban legend is that dreadlocks are achieved by not washing your hair. In reality, they are achieved by weaving shag rugs into your scalp.
Beehive - What is the attraction of wearing the hairstyle most likely to attract stinging insects? Next in vogue: The "Spider's Nest."
Jheri Curl - A style that resulted in a pile of luxurious, curly locks, the kind of which look fabulous on a woman. Unfortunately, the style was mainly worn by men, on whom it looked like a cheap wig.
Moptop - The style made famous by the Beatles, this got its name for looking like, well, a mop. This explains those movie scenes where lonely girls danced with mops. Actually, no, nothing explains those scenes.

Here There Be Monsters

2011-06-11T00:20:00.001-05:00

(River Monsters Theme Music)

TITLE: River Monsters

(Shot of host JEREMY WADE, reeling in a six-foot catfish.)

JEREMY WADE (voice over): I'm Jeremy Wade...

(Shot of JEREMY WADE holding up an enormous gar fish)

JEREMY WADE (voice over): ...biologist...

(Shot of JEREMY WADE, holding a saber and fencing with a swordfish)

JEREMY WADE (voice over): ...writer...

(Shot of JEREMY WADE hauling in a Great White Shark with a butterfly net)

JEREMY WADE (voice over): ...and extreme angler.

(Shot of Jeremy's Producer, MARTIN PERCHBRITCHES, standing on the bank of a river in Africa. JEREMY is behind him, fishing.)

MARTIN: ...And I'm Jeremy's producer, Martin Perchbritches. Tonight, we're going to show you just what goes into to making an episode of River Monsters.

TITLE: River Monsters: [Graphic Overlay fly-in] Behind the Scenes

(Return to shot of Jeremy's producer, standing on the bank. JEREMY is still behind him, patiently fishing.)

MARTIN: There's a lot of effort and love that goes into these productions...

(As Martin speaks, we can see that Jeremy has got something on the line.)

MARTIN: ...Jeremy travels to remote and difficult locations...

(JEREMY is digging his heels in, as whatever is on the line puts up a fierce battle.)

MARTIN: ...and does all this with a doggedly loyal camera crew in tow.

(Suddenly, JEREMY is yanked off of the bank and goes flying through the air, into the water.)

MARTIN: All because of the tremendous spirit of one man (turns to look at JEREMY), Jeremy W... wait a tic, where's he gone?

(Camera pans to river, where JEREMY is in waist-deep water, wrestling an 12 foot long Sawfish.)

JEREMY: It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish!...

(CUT TO MARTIN, sitting in a outdoor restaurant in Lima, Peru.)

MARTIN: Jeremy can get very excited when he's fishing. It's up to us to balance that energy and the demands of a one-hour show.

(Shot of JEREMY, fishing from a small boat, with a rod and reel)

MARTIN (voice over): For example, most of his larger catches take a tremendous amount of time to land.

(Suddenly, the line goes taut and starts to reel out as a fish takes the bait.)

JEREMY: Fish on! Fish on! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! Fish on! It's a fish! It's a fish!...(fades)

MARTIN (voice over): Depending on how much sleep he's had and how good a breakfast, Jeremy can go on shouting about a catch for quite a long time.

(Shot of JEREMY with rod and reel, battling to reel the fish in)

CAPTION: Four hours later

JEREMY: ...It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish! Fish on! Fish on! It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish!...

(CUT TO MARTIN, standing on a hillside, by a large lake in Saskatchewan, Canada. JEREMY is fishing in the background.)

MARTIN: Then, there's the sheer danger of Jeremy casting his rod and reel into an unknown tributary or lake...

(In the background, JEREMY has hooked something again and agitatedly starts to reel in his catch.)

MARTIN: It's the mystery and the danger of it all. The suspense of wondering what's down there in the depths....

(Suddenly, a SASQUATCH comes out of the water, hooked to Jeremy's line. They begin to wrestle.)

MARTIN (Without looking behind): ...never knowing what might come out.

(The SASQUATCH judo flips JEREMY.)

(CUT TO JEREMY, MARTIN, and CREW sitting at a table, with pictures of various large, ugly, dangerous looking fish)

MARTIN: (Voice over) We spend hours looking at potential river monsters and setting up new challenges for Jeremy.

MARTIN (in shot): How about piranha, Jeremy? Would you be willing to stand in a river with them?

JEREMY: Well, unless they're agitated it might be all right.

MARTIN: How about the flesh eating longfin eels? These things bunch up in swarms.Would you swim with them?

JEREMY: The right kind of suit and protective clothing, and it would be just fine.

MARTIN: What about this fish, the red bellied Pacu? Would you be willing to get in the water with that one? It's said to have bitten off a man's willy.

JEREMY: (Falling out of chair) (Expletive deleted) no (Expletive deleted)! You get in the (Expletive deleted) (Expletive deleted) water with those (Expletive deleted) (Expletive deleted), you (Expletive deleted).
(Long pause) Still, it would give a new meaning to the phrase, "Fish on!"

MARTIN (voice over): Jeremy always has a wonderful sense of humour about these things.

(Cut to JEREMY, standing at the bow of an old pirate ship, wearing an eye patch. He has a parrot on his shoulder.)

MARTIN: There were some episodes that didn't work out. For example, tracking down the Kraken.

(Large tentacle swoops out of the water)

JEREMY: It's a fish! It's a fish! It's a fish!...

(CUT TO MARTIN sitting in a restaurant in Peru)

MARTIN: He would have had the Kraken, if only he'd brought his 20,000 lb. test reel. Instead he went with the lasso and harpoon. (Long pause) It cost him his parrot.

(Shot of JEREMY in a corner of the ship, covered in bright colored feathers, wiping tears from his eyes with the eye patch.)

MARTIN (voice over): He was inconsolable.

(Shot of JEREMY, standing on top of a mountain in Nepal, with a large rod and reel in hand)

MARTIN: (voice over) Still, at the end of the day, he master them all: shark, pacu, snakehead, pirahna, swordfish, sawfish, catfish, dogfish, parrotfish, bream, monkfish, tuna, cod, hallibut, eel, (fades into the background) tilapia, haddie, fugu, salmon...

TITLE: River Monsters

Where the Heck Have I Been?

2011-05-24T22:36:00.002-05:00

...Working, mainly. I have been tweeting when I can, which is more infrequently than usual. I have decided to regale you with some of my recent tweets, as I'm still working on some other bits for DoUI. Rather than pick them myself though, I thought I'd let the good people of Twitter make the choice (and not just because I'm lazy, you cynics).

So, here are some of my most recent tweets to get re-tweeted. I hope you get as much fleeting amusement as the kind people who re-tweeted them.

I lost my job as a snake handler. They said I didn't know a rattlesnake from my asp. #repundancy
Redundancy Man - He automatically acquires the superpower of a hero who just completed a job. #LameSuperHeroes
Potluck Be a Lady, Tonight #ZombieSongs
I Beret the Living #Frenchmovies
Ronald McDonald? If we're going to target fast food icons, couldn't we start with the perverted Burger King first? #foodpolicesuck
Star Wars V: The Empire Surrenders #Frenchmovies #onlykiddingFrance!
Dude, Where's My Peugeot? #Frenchmovies
Dear @CDCemergency In your helpful post on prepping for a #zombie apocalypse, you left out a key item: Shotguns. Lots and lots of shotguns.
Charlie and the Tranya Factory #KidsStarTrekBooks
The reason Donald Duck is trending? You get attention when you don't wear pants. #badattention
Now that Donald Trump is out of the race, the mantle for worst hair in the running moves to Gary Johnson. Carry it well, Gary!
Donald Trump is not running for president. He didn't feel he could stand overseeing another bankruptcy.
It amazes me how many non-theists will latch on to Stephen Hawking's atheist statements but have nothing to say about his info loss paradox.
"Beep beep ring, beep, whistle, beep, pants" #replaceawordinastarwarslinewithpants
It's #starwarsday so you can expect to see an 800% increase in "light sabre" euphemisms on Twitter, today.
Everything Blows Up When I Drive My Car #nicolascagemovieideas

Osama's Last Stand

2011-05-04T00:16:00.000-05:00

Well, Osama bin Laden* is sleeping with the fishes tonight, courtesy of the U.S. Navy SEALS. Osama was buried at sea, where presumably he's well on his way to hosting a new, especially rancid bit of coral reef, although some suggest he sunk straight to the bottom and then just kept on going. Just think, one moment he was facing off with America's finest in his master bedroom thinking that, at worst, he would wake up to a plethora of nubile virgins; the next, he's getting the mother of all hot-feet** in the universe's BBQ pit.

It was inevitable of course. When you're responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans, the questions are not if so much as when, and whether or not the ordinance is going to rip a new hole or use some existing orifice.

Reportedly, bin Laden was found in a "mansion" rather the deluxe cavern most people envision him in. At some level this is very disappointing, because let's face it, most of us liked the idea of Al Queda's mastermind sleeping on a large rock in the darkness, wondering if the dodgy looking stalactite above his head would get him before a Tomahawk missile did. I for one took some comfort in the idea that bin Laden lived in far less comfort than even the Flintstones.

Instead, it appears that he led a moderately domestic life. It's hard to think of the world's most wanted man, casually traipsing into the house with all the casualness of Ricky Ricardo, only in this case after a hard day's work plotting the violent deaths of civilians instead of the usual evening show with the band. All the comforts of home with his assorted Lucys, little Rickys, and Al-Zawahiri his Fred Mertz is a bit much to handle. Although reports indicate that there were no phone or Internet connections to the home, I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Obama had satellite television with a variety of jihadist networks, Al-Jazeera, and Oprah's network (because not even bin Laden would cross Oprah).

The secrecy, the help from rogue Pakistani security agents, the big walls, and the domestic facade couldn't protect him. Now he is literally history, room temperature, toast. This is an ex-terrorist.

* Or as some of us at DoUI like to refer to him, Osucka Big Longun
** Admittedly, this is a leftover Saddam Hussein joke.

A Surprising Royal Wedding

2011-04-30T00:13:00.001-05:00

Well, it was a grand wedding this morning, or so I heard. I was too busy catching up on some much needed sleep, due to staying up to watch soccer matches and reruns of the American version of Who's Line Is It Anyway?

Still, great stuff, and William and Kate make a lovely couple. However, every wedding has its share of surprises, and this royal one was no exception.

Top 12 Surprises at the Royal Wedding

Brief soccer riot near Chaucer's tomb
Kate Middleton arrived in a '66 Ford Mustang
During Kate Middleton's vows, the word "obey" was replaced with "shag rotten."
All fish and chips reception menu
Flower girls' pop-and-lock dance routine.
Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean, Black Adder) conducted the service, and proceeded to make every pronunciation error he did in Four Weddings and a Funeral.
Queen's unexpected "Off with her head!" practical joke
Prince Harry was stone cold sober.
American reporter mistakenly thought William was marrying Kate Gosselin
Camilla's wardrobe malfunction
Crowd at Westminster Abbey singing "There's only one William Arthur Philip Louis"
Elton John caught the bouquet!

Watch Where You Toss That Garter Your Highness!

2011-04-25T21:49:00.008-05:00

The Royal Wedding of His Most Royal Highness, William, Prince of Wales, Viceroy of Something or Other, Earl of Fando (no, wait, that one is me), etcetera, etcetera... and good ole' Kate Middleton is this Friday. As I write this, thousands of British civil servants are busily preparing for the mammoth nuptials, and the cast of this season's Bridezillas are locked in their dressing rooms, fuming at how easily they have been upstaged.

Officials predict that over 600,000 people will visit Britain to see the wedding, and that's not including stalkers and paparazzi.* Estimates of the cost of royal wedding range between $30 million and a bajillion-jillion U.S. (that's only a bajillion Pound Sterling, however). There will be 40,000 flowers (necessitating entire double-decker busloads of Scots Guard-drilled flower girls), 187 groomed horses (the ungroomed ones will be holding down the fort at Buckingham Palace), and 100 million pints of beer (and that's just Prince Harry's allotment).

Over 2 billion people are expected to tune in to the wedding, listening to breathless royal watchers say things like:

"Insiders say that Her Royal Highness the Queen is very, very, very, very, very, very, very proud."
"Harry and Kate have told me - through a close and dear mutual friend - that the honeymoon location is a complete secret."
"Kate's dress is a specially created Libelula gown by designer Sophie Cranston. The dress is an original worth more money than Vera Wang and Oscar de la Renta will ever earn in their entire lifetimes."
"I would gladly lick the boots of the royal couple until my tongue were blistered and ...oh, wait, is my mic live?"

It's a massive event, to be sure.Many of you attending the royal wedding are likely to be nervous and excited for the couple. And of course, some of you (Mr. Atkinson, friend of the groom, I'm looking at you) are notorious pranksters and farceurs. To avoid spoiling the royal day, here are some things to avoid:

During the ceremony:

No Wedding Crashers. If Vince Vaughan and Owen Wilson can't get into this one, neither can you.
Do not arrive in one of those "tuxedo" t-shirts. Not only will you not be granted omission, you will be beaten up by English Rugby players who are friends of the groom.
Do not comment on how funny the Archbishop's hat is.
Don't say out loud, "How can anyone see anything from over there?" in reference to the shape of the nave. You're missing the point. They're over there for a reason.
If the officiant says the linen, "Be there any here who object to this union, speak now or forever hold your peace," be sure to hold your peace. HRH Elizabeth has given strict instructions to use the royal mace on anyone who opens their pie hole to respond to that.
If the bride flings the bouquet, do not dive in front of HRH the Queen to catch it. Kate is probably just tricking you into making yourself a target for security.
No "Lay that pipe!" comments or any other lines from Tom Hanks' Bachelor Party. "Bangers" jokes are right out.
Do not attempt, at any time, to hide under the bride's train.
Anyone attempting to recreate the final scene of The Graduate will be shot.

During the recessional parade:

Flash photography is acceptable. Flashing the royal couple is punishable by drawing and quartering. (Think the last scenes in Braveheart)
No drunken brawls. This is no place for hooligans. If there's to be any drunken brawling, the royal family can manage it themselves, thank you very much.
Do not mock the royal wave. If you do, you may get the royal V-sign (and I'm not talking about the one for "Victory.") Plus, it's a bit like certain types of dancing. You may think you can do it, but you'll just end up looking silly on television.
If you're going to wear the Prince Charles novelty fake ears, at least wear them with a sense of decorum.
Do not try to start the wave in the crowd.
No pelting the royal couple with Silly String.
No Funky Chicken at any time.
Do not shout, "I give it six months, tops!"

It's a big event and the couple seems like a sweet pair of kids. Here's to them and to a ginormous British party.

*What's the difference between stalkers and paparazzi? Paparazzi are paid professionals. Any old amateur can be a stalker.

Dollars, Taxes*

2011-04-18T07:00:00.002-05:00

It's not April the 15th, but it is Tax Day here in the U.S. of A. Thanks to a District of Columbia holiday (Fredrick Douglass MacArthur Day), the deadline to file your tax return is three days later than usual. This of course means that the average person waited three days longer to throw everything together at the last minute. (I filed mine electronically, last night. Ha!)

So, many of you are sweating right now like Cee-Lo Green performing at a ladies church social. Never fear! Here are a few last minute tax tips to make your day go smoother.**

You cannot declare your pets as dependents. No matter how close you are to Mr. NumNums, he's not technically your child. A good way to distinguish between actual children and pets is to remember that actual children are not neutered.
Under no circumstance are Sloppy Joes a business expense, even if you own a restaurant. (Who ever heard of a successful Sloppy Joe joint? Man up and take the loss.)
We do not recommend that you write your opinions of the tax process in the margins of the form. Anonymous e-mails from offshore accounts are the preferred method for this kind of venting.
Putting dollar bills in a lap dancer's brassiere can not be counted as a charitable deduction, no matter how unappealing she is.
The Alternative Minimum Tax is not a tax for people who like the Grateful Dead and smoking weed. You need to file forms 3089-XYZ if you fall under this classification.
All checks for tax due should be made out to the IRS, not "President Obama."
Returns should be mailed in standard addressed envelopes. The US Postal Service will not deliver returns that are tied to bricks that have smashed through their windows.***
Extensions for filing taxes may only be filed if you have a good reason. Slept through April due to Tequila coma is not a good reason.
Sign your own name to the return, please. You have no idea what kind of living hell the IRS is putting poor Ivana Mann, of Tupelo, Mississippi, through.

* With apologies to Chico Marx
** We are not responsible in any way for the physical examination you receive from the IRS if you choose to follow some of these tips. We will tell you that those rubber gloves are really cold.
*** At least, they haven't yet.

Masters Madness

2011-04-08T00:30:00.000-05:00

Well, no one fell for National Public Nudity Day, if you don't count my bathrobe slipping off when I went to get the newspaper. * However, a different kind of madness is settling in a week later. It's time for The Masters.

Every year, a collection of rowdy, ill-disciplined, smelly, and violent brutes gathers at the Augusta National golf course in Augusta, Georgia. There, these media personalities are hosed off, disinfected, and horsewhipped until words like "bikini-wax" and "swing those shafts" are purged from their vocabulary. After that, they don special ESPN and CBS attire, approved by the secret cabal that runs the golf club.

After this the golfers themselves show up and the process begins all over again, especially for John Daly, Tiger Woods, Fuzzy Zoeller, and anyone who "talks funny."

The Masters is as old-fashioned as a ...well, as an old-fashioned.

It's also steeped in tradition: The Green Jackets**, Magnolia Lane, Butler Cabin, the Par-3 Tournament, the Champions Dinner, the ceremonial tee-off of legendary players (I hear this year it's Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, and that Tin Cup guy), Mint Juleps, and charming old Southern members who talk so slow, you could play a round with them before they'd finished introducing themselves.

There are a few lesser known traditions:

The Annual Running Off of the Riff Raff with the Official Masters Electric Cattle Prod
The Annual Shunning of the National Organization of Women Protesters
The Annual Sweet Tea Drink Off (Followed by the Unofficial Annual Filling of Rae's Creek)
The Bi-Annual Castigation of CBS for Some Imagined Oversight in Order to Keep those "Television Hippies" in Line

The course is a beauty, or at least it is on television (especially HDTV). The average golf fan will never see the legendary Magnolia-lined, rolling hills and severely sloping greens in person. Even the fans are vetted, with a limited number of tickets available to a pre-approved list of people who have undergone the necessary physical examinations and gotten the appropriate haircut.

That and the pimento cheese sandwiches add to the rarefied atmosphere.

The golf itself is fascinating. The greens undulate like Shakira in a Red Bull-fueled dance-off. On occasion a slow putt will roll by the hole, the way a retired couple in an RV casually sight-sees the upper Mid-West, only to stop well off the green, twice as far away from the hole than when it started.

The average golfer probably feels just a little bit of Schadenfreude when something like that happens to the greatest golf pros in the world. However, this is swept away when a player turns around and sinks a 90 foot putt along those same mountainous contours.

One of the courses where I used to live had a couple of copies of the par 3 holes from Augusta National, numbers 12 and 16. The first time I played the number 16 copy, my ball found its way to the bottom of the front of the green. The hole was cut in the center, halfway up an imposing grade, with the grass cut so low, a June bug wouldn't so much as tickle his belly walking over it.

The first three putts I hit at the hole came right back down to my feet.

As the old PGA signature line goes, "These guys are good." It's gonna be a fun weekend.

*Late April Fools! We don't get a paper.
** The Green Hornet can only wish he could get one of these.

The Bare Necessities

2011-04-01T00:02:00.006-05:00

It's that time of year again! National Public Nudity Day is upon us, that day when all Americans are required by the Articles of Confederation to take off our clothes and wigs (it's a Revolutionary era thing) and otherwise conduct business as usual. As unpleasant as that may be for most of us, it is our patriotic duty as Americans, so get naked, people!

Being a non-citizen won't get you out of this. If you've got a green card, are here on a student visa, or are vacationing legally in the country and aren't tooling around in the buff tomorrow, expect to get repeatedly tasered by cranky, naked local law authorities. (You'd be cranky too, if you had to pin a cold, metal badge on your naked body.)

No, seriously, it's just April Fools' Day.

No, SERIOUSLY, put the pants back on. (Underwear first, please.)

The thing to remember about April Fools' Day is that 99% of April Fools gags are lame. (Editor: Starting with the opening of this piece.) This results in the complete waste of a day that should be dedicated to a variety of witty japes, sublime pranks, and obtuse tautologies.

Wait, scratch that last one. Those aren't funny at all, unless you're an easily amused logic professor.

Fortunately, we're here to help! Here are a few tips to make your April Fools' gags memorable.*

1. Plan ahead.

Nothing is more pathetic than a last minute, off the cuff April Fools gag. Most of these are of the "Don't move, there's something crawling in your hair" variety. Occasionally, someone will throw out a "Are you OK, you look really pale," or a "You're still here! I thought I heard the boss say they were transferring you to Montana." Very desperate, unorganized wannabe pranksters will fall back on the unconvincing, "Look out!"

Boooorrrring!

If you want a really convincing prank, you must put some thought into it, and plan accordingly. Take the example of the feudal barons who presented King John with the Magna Carta. The original idea was that they were going to scam him into giving them access to his personal archery range and a keg of porter. Instead, by creating a convincing document, and hiring some very intimidating early football hooligans, they were able to convince John to sign over Stonehenge, wear a dress for a month, and hoot like a barn owl (along with the usual hodgepodge of rights that dull historians like to focus on, to prove how smart they are).

2. Use convincing props.

Don't rely on cheap rubber snakes or bugs when real ones will do. For example, the average person is not going to know the difference between a Fer-de-Lance and an agitated Corn Snake.

If the prank involves fake fires, you might consider placing small, safe fires much closer in the line of sight of the intended victim, to create the illusion of a large, dangerous fire melting their Lexus. However, do not just stand in front of them, holding a lighter and making clumsy explosion noises.

3. Instead of cheap shocks, go for awe.

Most April Fools pranks involve scaring the bejeebers** out of people. Save those gags for Halloween, Rush Week, and Flag Day. A proper April Fools Day jape should leave your victims with a sense of awe. Whether you leave them feeling totally fooled or merely quizzically befuddled, leave them thinking for just a moment that they're seeing something they never expected to see.

The fake celebrity sighting is a nice move in this direction. Who among us wouldn't feel just a little bit more special after having a Charlie Sheen impersonator tell them they were "winning?" Well, most of us, but some people are really awed by Charlie these days.

Even more effective is the "supposedly dead celebrity" sighting. However, avoid Elvis here, as the number of professional impersonators makes a definitive Elvis sighting highly implausible. The same rule applies to Cher, in certain sections of New York and San Francisco.

Even better is the extraterrestrial sighting, or the mythical creature sighting (The Loch Ness Monster, Yeti, or Sasquatch, outside of the set of a Jack's Links commercial). The key is "authenticity," the level of which depends on the relative IQ of your victim. Rule of thumb: For an Albert Einstein you'd need a highly crafted, anatomically accurate costume and carefully modulated sound effects. For a Kim Kardashian, a G.I. Joe doll with the words "I AM BIGFOOT," written on in crayon, should do the trick.

4. Use your imagination.

Don't take the simple route if an artistic flourish might produce better results. When Lewis and Clark pretended to travel to the Pacific Ocean (still one of the all-time greats), they didn't settle for a collection of fake Indian trinkets, "exotic" tree leaves, and a couple of quickly scribbled maps. They went out and hired an Irish seamstress named "Sacajawea" to portray an authentic Indian woman to sell their joke. To this day, most Americans don't know that "Sacajawea" is Irish Gaelic for "Gone fishing."

The creators of the Leaning Tower of Piza went so far as to build the entire town of Piza at a slight angle, just to convince tourists that the tower was leaning. When visitors ask why their coffee wants to lean up against one side of their cup, the locals just tell them the cups are made lopsided, "in honor of the tower."

5. Have fun.

Nothing kills an Aprils Fools' Day prank like an over-serious prankster. It's not life and death (unless you do one of those pranks*** in which case it is life and death, you lousy sociopath), so enjoy your pranking, and join in on the fun by acting as though you too are amazed that "Celine Dion" just happened to shop at the same Safeway as your brother-in-law, or that you just realized your girlfriend's cat is "half-Yeti."

And if the joke doesn't come off, don't skulk around for the rest of the day****. Start planning for next year!

* According to our lawyer, F Johnny Lee, we are required to inform you that this advice is for entertainment purposes only, and you are a "freakin' idiot" if you follow this "advice."
** Or as the kids like to say, the "justinbeibers"
*** Which again, we must insist you do not, under any circumstances, do... ever. Even if you have a brain impairment.
**** Unless of course this is part of the prank. One of the greatest April Fools Jokes of all time was perpetrated by a Mr. Stanley Waugh of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada in 1974, when he pretended to stage a lame April Fools joke that "didn't work." He then spent the rest of the day pretending to sulk and becoming gradually more depressed, resulting eventually in a spectacular faked suicide involving a chainsaw, his head, and three cannons.

Five Keyboarding Fingers of Death!

2011-03-30T01:27:00.000-05:00

You too can learn Kung-Fu online!

Well, I actually haven't learned Kung-Fu online myself, but I am considering it now that the world's first online Kung-Fu school is in business. Soon, I will be dealing out thunderous punishment to obnoxious thugs with the devastating art of 7 Star Praying Mantis Kung Fu. And based on the sample video, I will be doing so to the raucous sounds of ear-splitting* rock music.

(Quick Quiz: What's the best style of music for practicing Kung-Fu? Answer: Thrash.)

I haven't decided what I'm going to do with my new found Kung-Fu prowess, once I obtain it. I'm torn between being the new Chuck Norris and getting one of those Hong Kong wire-fighting gigs. Since I can't grow a decent beard** or speak Cantonese, I may have to find an alternate solution.

I'm trying to avoid the more disconcerting questions about learning Kung-Fu online. For example, how do you learn how hard to strike human bones to make that cracking noise you hear in Bruce Lee films? Also, who am I going to practice that on? (I figure in regular Kung-Fu schools they hire people for that, the same way neurologists hire people for sleep studies and brain probing.)

Also, what kind of insurance guarantees come with the courses? I would like to avoid relying on my regular health insurance, should I lose concentration while walking on air or performing a flying spin move with a sword. In this latter case, I am of course referring to liability insurance.

Unfortunately, I can't start training right away, as I'm recovering from a bad ankle sprain*** and a pulled back muscle. Given that it's online Kung-Fu training, I'm hoping there are a lot of virtual exercises I can do from a reclining easy chair. Anything relating to breathing or leaning way back, I can easily handle right now.

One of the moves described on the Web-site is call the "Crushing Step." I'd like to learn that one, but only if it isn't a description of a violent, self-inflicted ankle sprain.

Also, I'm wondering if they do virtual sparring? I've always thought the word "Skype" sounds like an act of violence, like "shiv" or "shank." Now, I might get the chance to find out.

My only real concern is that if I convert my hands into steely weapons of death, I'm that much more likely to kill my computer while typing these posts.****

* Get it? Kung-Fu? Ear-splitting?
** Also, I don't look good in a cowboy hat.
*** It was in a soccer match, if you must know.
**** Bonus points for those of you who thought "If only!"

Super Android Destroyer Guitar Player Sidecar Guy!

2011-03-25T14:27:00.000-05:00

When I was a kid, I lived in Hawaii for four years. Usually, when I say this people are momentarily distracted from staring at whichever parts of my hair are sticking out of place that day. They smile, make momentary eye contact, and say things like, "Cool, dude you must have hung out at the beach all the time."

The funny thing is that I rarely went to the beach. When you're in elementary school, you can't just hop in the dune buggy, grab some brews, and cruise the beach. Mom and dad frowned upon that sort of thing, as did the military law enforcement*. Also, I hate the way wet sand chafes in my swimming trunks.

Most kids cruised the neighborhood streets on their bikes. One of my best friends had a neon-green, three-speed chopper, with three working lights up front and a little plastic, gold-painted winged victory statue, just our in front of the long, sleek handlebars. If Evel Knievel had seen this bike, he would have immediately dropped his whole red, white, and blue motif and cornered the market on plastic statues.

After a few months, my friend grew bored with the green design, painted the bike neon-orange, and replaced the handlebars with a black, rubber-gripped steering wheel. The guys on Top Gear would've drooled in puddles.

We also bowled. We bowled a lot. I'm not sure why.

Anyway, in addition to biking, bowling, and other youthful pursuits, one thing most kids in Hawaii had in common was that we watched oodles of Japanese television. I loved most of the shows. The cop and private detective shows all had ample quantities of high-energy, bone-crunching Karate. (Seriously, the Foley artists were probably up to their ears in cracked chicken bones.) The samurai shows were like westerns, only the gunslingers had long, lethal swords that were so sharp, you got the impression their foes were all made of butter that had sat out on Waikiki Beach a few hours in mid-summer heat. The sports consisted primarily of Sumo wrestling, which combined brutal pancake smack-downs with hilariously inadequate costumes.

However, the coolest shows were, by far, the superhero programs.

There were cartoon superheroes, of course. Two decades before most people in the US had heard the words "anime" or "manga," we were watching them on KIKU, Channel 13, Japanese language, out of Honolulu. We saw Raideen, soon to be of the "Shogun Warriors." Getta-Robo-G was another favorite. They were unlike anything in the U.S. The heroes were colorful, giant robots, the villains were so weird that in later years, I imagined hippies must have seen them on really bad acid trips. The music was bright and dynamic. There was violence to be done, and it was done in the most grandiose style.

But even those looney programs couldn't match the full-out wackiness of the live-action shows. The live-action programs contained robots, animal robots, shape-shifting mystical warriors, guys who looked like insects, giant extraterrestrials, half-animal/half-men warriors, and at least one robot who turned into a motorcycle. All of them knew martial arts, of course.

For American kids weaned on Superman and Batman, it was like falling through the rabbit hole and waking up with Alice's cool, kick-butt, Japanese friends and their whacked mechanical enemies.

The first show I remember seeing was Kikaida. Kikaida is Japanese for "Destroyer," which any kid will tell you is a great name for a superhero. (It was also the name of at least one KISS album.) Kikaida was the story of a guy named Jiro, who rode around on his motorcycle and sidecar, somberly playing his guitar and trying to do the right thing. It all sounds like an American 60's-era road movie, except for the fact that the "do the right thing" part consisted of Jiro changing into a super android and kicking the utter crap out of a collection of freaky, evil robots.

The inventor of the freaky, evil robots was a demented madman named Professor Gill. I assume he could only go by Professor, because he failed the very easy to pass Doctoral sanity test (See Dr. No, Dr. Jekyll, Dr. Shrinker, etc.) This tells you just how completely mental the guy was. Visually, it was even more obvious, because he wore his hair and dressed like the leader of a hippie, suicide cult. A guy like that would have to rely on androids because his human followers probably had the lifespan of a sickly fly.

The evil robots themselves took the form of over-caffeinated, monochromatic animals. Grey Rhino, Green Mantis, Blue Buffalo, and many others faced off with Kikaida, and despite their wild, menacing gesticulations, they were always done in at the end, literally, by a cross-chop that Kikaida delivered while shouting, "The End!**" in heavily-accented English.The villains were mangled worse than the pronunciation, exploding more dramatically than Keith Olbermann at a George W. Bush foreign policy retrospective.

The chief robots were assisted by lesser robots who were dressed in gray body suits, with weird red and black faces that seemed to be a cross between demon faces and Cardinals (the bird, not the baseball team or Catholic officials). These robots wielded flimsy spears and also wore, I kid you not, Chuck Taylor basketball shoes. (Take a look again at the link: Chuck Taylor's, classic black. I guess these 'droids could play some ball.) These characters also shouted "Giru! Giru!" which was a reference to the demented Professor Gill. To us kids it sounded like they were shouting "Get 'em! Get 'em!" So, naturally, we called these androids the "Get 'em Guys." Only, they never got 'em.

The show was great demented fun. The robots would set up some ridiculous scheme, usually involving kidnapping and explosions. At the height of the scheme they would suddenly hear a soothing guitar riff and look up to find Jiro standing at the top of a nearby cliff or mountain. Jiro would then dramatically point at the villains and announce that he was hear to save the day. He would then flip down and fight them for a little while as Jiro, and then change into Kikaida, in a transformation sequence than can only be described with the words "70's video technology."

Sometimes, he would change directly into Kikaida, just to change things up a bit.

Anyway, just the other day, as a result of a brilliant birthday gift from Mrs. Fando, I got to see this delightful television series again. The first six episodes are on DVD and they are sitting in our house. We watched the first one, to the massive amusement of our daughter, who's RiffTrax-like commentary was only slightly dissuaded by my pointing out that we were watching a "small piece of my childhood." By "slightly," I mean "not at all."

(Seriously, to the great folks at RiffTrax, Japanese television is a perfect vehicle for your talents. I heartily recommend the episode of Ultra Man with the monster named "Jirass," which in Japanese is apparently pronounced "Jour Ass." Hours of fun in a 30-minute episode.)

There are many more Japanese "Henshin" (transformation) heroes: Kikaida 01, Rainbow Man (sadly unavailable on DVD - this may be the most deranged series of them all), various Kamen (Masked) Riders and Ultra Men, Zaboga - the robot who turned into a motorcycle***, Diamond Eye, the original Rangers that the sappy Power Rangers were based on (and are much more entertaining in the original Japanese) and many, many others.

American live action superheroes are positively anemic by comparison. Batman? That looks like a particularly chatty episode of Masterpiece Theater next to the average episode of Kikaida. They used lopsided shots of the villains' hideouts in Batman? The villains in Kikaida were themselves frequently lopsided!

Good times! Good, good times!

*At least as far as little kids are concerned. As far as I could tell, it was their preferred off-duty past-time.
** Apparently, in later episodes, he shouted "Denji Endo," which means "Electromagnetic End." As far as I can remember, they sounded the same.
*** He also had a little helicopter than flew out of his head, and two halves of a little car that would drive out of his feet and magnetically pop together. If the series had lasted longer, we might have seen a train fly out of his butt.

Old News, New News

2011-03-15T01:00:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the dearth of posts on my part the last few weeks. Live Tweeting the Oscars was mentally and physically exhausting, particularly the after-party, which consisted of me, a bottle of lager, and a very unwieldy bottle opener.

It's been a fairly awful two weeks since then, as far as global news. The Oscars were so depressingly bad that it seemed like piling on to follow up. James Franco gave a new meaning to the phrase "deer in the headlights." Which is to say he was like a deer, actually stuck in a car's headlights.

Anne Hathaway gave it a go. She was like the plucky kid in a high school rendition of Bye Bye Birdie.You were rooting for her, but she was never going to lift the proceedings beyond what they were.

Parent 1: "Hey, that Hathaway girl's not bad."
Parent 2: "Yeah, (yawn) wake me when it's over so I can offer a smattering of encouraging applause."

Soon after the Oscars, Charlie Sheen presented some hope with a fascinatingly bizarre collection of comments. Between "tiger blood" and "winning," Sheen seemed on the verge of a new Joaquin Phoenix-like comic persona ... until it turned out that he wasn't kidding. The proceedings quickly turned from comic to sad and disconcerting, like watching a street performer and slowly realizing he's actually a homeless panhandler with particularly vivid hallucinations. Randy Quaid started to look taciturn and sober-minded by comparison. Comics known for their unsentimental verbal disemboweling of stuck up celebrities were expressing their extreme discomfort at Sheen jokes. It was like watching sharks swim up on a badly wounded tuna and saying, "Man, even I can't bring myself to eat that poor bastard."

For awhile there was some hope that Moammar Gaddafi, the pompous, delusional, murdering thug who runs Libya might be overthrown. Gaddafi, as always, did his best to provide comic relief from his own authoritarian butchery, by giving rambling, disjointed speeches and wearing robes that made Chairman Kaga from Iron Chef look like Buster Brown. It might have been slightly entertaining, if not for the fact that Gaddafi-supporters were shooting down protesters in cold blood.

Then New Zealand, which was a sad story.

Then Japan.

I think of the Indonesian tsunami and the Haitian earthquake and now Japan. Some stories can't be mocked, can't be lightened, can't be deflated, and shouldn't.

So, let's leave it at that for the moment. Sometimes laughter isn't the best medicine.

Japan

2011-03-14T23:45:00.000-05:00

Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Japan. Terrible, terrible news and events these past few days.

Good Medicine

2011-02-28T21:44:00.001-06:00

I was so terribly distraught by the shut out of Enthiran at the Academy Awards, I thought I might never recover. Then I came across the following video. Since then, I have watched this video nine times, and with each successive viewing, I am one step closer to alright.

Old Man Does The Old Man Dance - Watch more Funny Videos

Live Oscar Blog

2011-02-27T23:51:00.007-06:00

The Oscar Awards are going on right exactly now at this very moment while the television is turned on. Yes, this very moment in time, as the hand of the clock moves, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is handing out cheap fake gold bald-man awards to every movie under the sun EXCEPT Enthiran, the Kollywood blockbuster. Oh well. Chitti will deal with these "suits" in due time.

In the meantime, let me give you my own play by play of the evening's events as they unfold. That's right, AS THEY UNFOLD. I sense doubt on your part. I'm not sure what you're doubting.

11:55pm - Jack Nicholson's botox just popped and his forehead flopped down into his lap.

11:57pm -- Natalie Portman just accepted an award for playing a stank ho ballet dancer with bird feather stems oozing out of her shoulder blade area. And look at her! Whoa, she's gained weight. Guess that fettuccine alfredo fat camp didn't work. Strangely, she's only gained the weight right in the belly area. Is she tippling the absinthe again? I can't figure it out. I mean, that belly is huge. What could possibly explain the weight gain? I'm baffled.

11:58pm -- Diny Cowbossalou just presented the award for Worst Hat to Bastarde Pieu, the French director of the hit indie pic, Crondeme de la Miserable Stink.

11:59pm -- Colin Firth? For Pete's sake! He won another award. And there's Tom Hopper with an arm around his shoulder, emotionally accepting him. Colin's hair is nice and fluffy, though. I'll give him that. I'll bet he smells pretty good, like some kind of cologne with a hint of cognac and maybe sawdust.

12:07pm -- Christian Bale, people. He won something, but I was only half paying attention. Not sure what he won. Best...something-or-other. What is that bump on the side of his nose beside his eye? Some kind of nesting silverfish or something? Pick that bad boy off, old paint!

12:12pm -- Ah, Best Picture. Maybe they will surprise us all by secretly adding Enthiran to the mix. If Marlon Brando were still around, he'd waddle right up there to the podium, sweating and mumbling, and his cheeks would sag, and his saliva would glisten in the corners of his mouth, and strange white powder would be on his forehead, and he would see to it that Enthiran won. He would see to it. Where are you Marlon? Return from the terrible ether waves of eternity and fix this Hollywood establishment!

12:15am -- Well, there you go. The King's Speech won. I quit. I can't handle it anymore. Where is the love for Chitti the Robot? The King's Speech didn't have one musical dance number in it, NOT ONE! It's not right. What sort of crooked, mildewed measuring stick are they using in Hollywood to measure quality?

12:20am -- And the Academy Awards is over. There it is. I didn't love it. But I also didn't turn it off halfway through. I also spilled a little Sangria on my pants and it soaked right through. I'm going back to blogging about Mark Northover after this.

The Bestest Best Bestity Oscar Bestness

2011-02-25T02:00:00.006-06:00

The Oscars are Sunday. Already, actors and actresses are getting fitted for their designer clothes and/or eggs. Journalists who cover the celebrity beat are already doing their lip and tongue exercises to prepare for the massive amounts of butt-kissing and boot-licking they'll dish out on the red carpet. Nominees are crafting moving, poetic lines of thanks, which they will forget to read if they win, choosing instead to rely on rambling improvisation and copious waterworks.*

And don't forget those unforgettable Oscar musical numbers. Remember last year when Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin did that number with the thing, and there was that other thing. Or was that Steve and Whoopi? Or did Jon Stewart do that bit with the thing? Still, I'll never forget Snow White and whatshisname!

The important thing is that the Academy has named their ten nominees for Best Picture, and you can count on us to give you the run down on all of them. So, without further ado (which is Latin for "lame jokes"), here are your Oscar Best Picture nominees!

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Black Swan - In this surreal documentary about the cutthroat, perversely sexual, remarkably nude world of professional ballet, Natilie Portman plays a determined ballerina who has a serious Jones for her stuffed black swan doll. She carries it everywhere, including public restrooms, which means that it needs to be laundered quite a bit. Unfortunately, while "Swanniekins" is in the dryer, our little toe dancer gets a bit, well... psychotic. (Think Linus without his blanket, on meth.) She goes so nuts that while watching Carrie on Netflix, Carrie actually looks at her from the TV and says, "You are a freakin' nutcase, sister." Ironically, Carrie from Sex in the City only suggests that she use a more trendy contraceptive.

Anyway, after killing 17 audience members with a thrilling grand rond de jambe, the SWAT team chases her from the Lincoln Center to an abandoned runway in Jersey. They finally talk her out of setting off the nuclear bomb she has hidden in her leotard by providing her with a fresh-smelling Swanniekins. Unfortunately for our agile little nutjob, Swanniekins is swept into the propeller of a nearby taxiing Vought Corsair. Enraged, the ballerina attacks the plane, which as any schoolchild knows is a terrible mistake, and indeed, she is quickly finished off by the 12.7 millimeter M2 Browning machine guns.

The film ends with her incredible death scene, which rather than being graceful and poignant, instead involves a great deal of splatter, flying shell casings, and floating toy stuffing.

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The Fighter - At last Hollywood deigns to make a film about the legendary Vought F4U Corsair fighter and the tough, gritty Irish-American boxers that flew them.

The year is 1944 and the U.S. Navy is making a big push in the Pacific to put the Japanese Navy on their heels, even though they were fighting at sea. Two young Irish-American brothers, Mickey and Rooney, are pilots on the U.S.S. Hollywood, docked in Tokyo Bay and beating the crap out of Emperor Hirohito's summer palace.

In-between attacks on Hirohito's jacuzzi, fending off kamikazes with a fire hose, and the occasional fly by from Rodan, the brothers are competing for the ship boxing title. Unfortunately, Rooney suffers a debilitating brain injury when he makes the tactical pugilistic mistake of leading with his brain.
To honor his brother, Mickey vows to win the ship tourney and to also personally blow up Tojo's home gazebo.

He does this, in the film's climax, raining hell on the imported Mongolian grill and French bench seats with the Brazilian Rosewood trim.

**********

Inception - The mystifying story of an espionage team that uses a variety of psychological tricks and strategies to get something or other done to somebody.
Hell, I don't know. I saw it seventeen times and I'm not even sure who's in the film. Probably Keanu Reeves, Angelina Jolie, and whatnot. Inception sounds a lot like "conception," so we figure these lowlifes are just trying to get some poor gal knocked up against her will.

Anyway, people walk around on the ceiling (far less gracefully than Fred Astaire, if you ask me), get into a lot of slow-motion wire fights, drive a van pretty much everywhere except the road (at one point they make a three-point turn on the wing of a Vought Corsair), and enough buildings turn inside out to justify bringing back "Sensurround.^TM"

Anyway, the two hippies who were in the theater with me loved it. They also went through about 40 containers of popcorn per showing.

**********

The Kids Are All Right - Ever wonder what that Who song was about? Me too. When I was a kid, I would sit up at nights looking through microfiche of old Rolling Stones magazines for clues in the personals ads. I read the unauthorized autobiography of Pete Townshend (This Windmill Is Out of Control) 30 times looking for a hidden code about the song. The closest I got were the phrases "Kid all must destroy guitar, right?" and "Bite me, Paul and John."

Anyway, I watched Tommy and Quadrophenia several times, which was a waste of time because the song doesn't appear in either of the films. I wrote Roger Daltrey but only got a signed photograph with the inscription "You ask too many damn questions, lad."

32 documentaries, Dick Clark's secret memoirs, the Oxford Dictionary of Music, and one rambling conversation with Keith Moon's poodle Frenchy later I was still no closer to understanding the mystery of this great song. Finally though, I had a chance meeting with John Entwhistle at a Roy Rogers Restaurant in Alexandria, Virginia. As I was piling pickles and onions on to my combo burger, he looked me in the eye, and in a hushed and reverent tone, said "Could you slide down a bit so I can get some mustard, please?"

He then explained that the song was, "about this guy and his girl, and their friends, y'know?"

I don't think the film gets the song at all. It does contain an outstanding wide shot of a Vought Corsair, though.

**********

The King's Speech - This film is the story of the famous speech that HRH King George VI opf the United Kingdom made at the outset of World War II. Amazingly, the film manages to drag out the speech, which only lasted five minutes and 44 seconds in real life, to over two hours.

This astonishing feat is accomplished in several ways. First, there's a lot of slow motion of Colin Firth talking. While the ladies may love that sort of thing, it was more than a bit tedious for us guys, especially the 'plosives.

Also, the king drinks an incredible amount of water during the speech. At one point, every other word, he's reaching for the glass and having a long sip. He also excuses himself to the loo five times, which is not in the actual recording. (I'm assuming they edited that out of the recording because bathroom talk doesn't fit royal protocol.) He then takes a lengthy smoke break, during which he tours London in a Vought Corsair.

There's also a fist fight with Hitler. The film makes the circumstances of the fight somewhat obscure, but at some point, as the king is refilling his glass, Hitler breaks a chair over his head. Our hero the king quickly shakes this off and body slams Hitler unto a radio dramatic control panel. Eventually, the fight proceeds to the top of Big Ben, where the king cleverly pinches Hitler's mustache between the clock face hands. After Hitler mysteriously escapes, the king finishes his speech and breaks out into the song that runs during the credits.

Unfortunately, the historical accuracy of the film is severely compromised. The song the king sings is "Swinging on a Star," which wouldn't be written for another five years!

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127 Hours - This film is the awe-inspiring ordeal of a young man who is trapped underneath a rock for 127 hours. Unfortunately, the filmmakers decided to play out the events of the film in real time. For once, Leonard Maltin's description of a film as "overlong" is somewhat justified.

Aside from two very dry sleeping scenes, the film is relatively engaging. There are numerous monologues of quality, and the scene where the young man desperately tries to flag down a search plane (a Vought Corsair, if you must ask) had me weeping into my Raisinettes.

It's all based on a true story, which makes you feel terrible for the person it happened too, and which is why this particular synopsis is so short on jokes.

**********

The Social Network - This tawdry melodrama is about the invention of Facebook and the way in which Farmville and Mafia Wars destroyed Western Civilization.

The year is 2003. A young Harvard computer student (Justin Bieber) is sitting in his dorm room, trying to work up the courage to ask out a fiesty Women's Studies major (Alanis Morrisette). While trying to decide whether to take her to Wagamama (Lucy Liu) or an off-Broadway production of The Vagina Monologues (Oprah Winfrey), he accidentally trips over his jumbo-size model of the Battleship Galactica (Paul Williams) and face plants on his Intro to Programming book (Mickey Rooney).

This event, and the painful adjustment to his bridgework (Carl Reiner), causes him to have an ephipany (Julia Roberts), and he immediately began developing the concept of delivering DVD videos by mail. Unfortunately, he discovered that Netflix (Nancy McKeon) had beaten him to the idea by six years. So, he returned to his attempt to woo the Women's Studies major (now played by Betty White).

While booking tickets for Lilith Fair (Tina Fey), he stumbles over a derelict (Gary Busey), and tumbles through the window of a used bookstore (Adam West), planting his pie hole (Tom Brokaw) on a vintage, signed copy of the Tractatus Logico-Philisophicus (will.i.am). This immediately inspired him to create a search engine, which he named "Googing" (Nathan Fillion) He then changed his mind and named it "Bingle" (Vought Corsair). Finally, he realized that search engines had been around for years, and also, that he had a severe concussion (Pauly Shore).

He gives up trying to woo the Women's Studies major (now, Jim Rome) and instead fiddles around and creates an online site where people can incessantly pester people they haven't met in years with requests for farm visits and political diatribes.

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Toy Story 3 - This dark and brooding masterpiece of film noir opens with a tall, lanky cowboy, sitting in his detective agency, spinning a dark narrative of lust, betrayal, and murder.

Only kidding!!! It's another goofy Disney/Pixar comedy about playful toys who can make your heart sing with childlike laughter, and then turn around and wring tears out of your soul like it was a sodden ShamWow.

The plot involves the usual crap about one of the toys getting lost and the other toys violating all the "toy rules" to go and find it in a toy Vought Corsair named "Sammy". There is a surprising amount of gory violence, including a terrifying unstuffing scene, and at least two nude scenes (would someone buy that dinosaur some pants, please!) However, in the end all is well and the toys are safe and sound, except for the villainous toy, which is given the "Braveheart treatment."

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True Grit - The true story of the inventor of hominy grits, this whimsical fable opens with John Wayne traveling back in time (via a Vought Corsair, souped-up with a "time-flux capacitor"). Wayne is returning to the late nineteeth century to head off evil Nazis who have used their own time-machine (a Volkswagen Bug with a beanie propellor) to destroy America from within.

However, the Nazis only succeed in blowing up an outhouse in Fort Smith, Arkansas, which just happened to be occupied by Horace P. Whistletooth, the inventor of the the greatest breakfast cereal stuff ever.** Without grits, American soldiers fighting World War II have become listless and feckless, preferring to sit in their pup tents reading The Great Gatsby aloud, instead of bayoneting Nazis.

Wayne arrives in Fort Smith and manages to trick the Nazis into aggravating judge Issac Parker, the famous "hanging judge," by running over his pet geese with a steam engine. Parker sentences the Nazis to hang for "killin' muh geese" and not being able to pronounce the word "waffle" properly. However, Wayne impatiently shoots the Nazis with a gatling gun.

Later he frees Whistletooth from the outhouse, but in the process gets a bit of grit in his eye, inspiring Horace to create the now famous dish, and forcing Wayne to wear a patch over his eye for his next movie, The Fighting Seabees.

**********

Winter's Bone - Deep in the heart of the Ozark woods, a young woman finds a bone in a snowman. (A rib bone, gutter minds!) She quickly learns that this bone is special (Shhh!) belonging to former president John F. Kennedy. (Oh, all right! I give up ...go ahead.)

She quickly learns that the bone is really a key to a secret storage facilty that contains her father's worldly belongings: Seven tons of cement, a Bugatti Veyron, a vintage Farrah Fawcett poster (not the one in the bathing suit - she's wearing a monk's robes in this one), a Vought Corsair, 1200 boxes of Pocky, and a twleve foot pile of chicken bones.

She discovers that the chicken bones are actually an immense puzzle that when constructed takes the form of an even larger chicken bone! This puzzles her for months, until her hometown is attacked by a giant chicken! Hundreds of extras are relentlessly pecked until the young woman manages to lure the chicken to the secret storage facility.

At the sight of the gigantic chicken bone, the enormous chicken becomes filled with fear and promises to serve the woman forever, as long as she promises not to kill him "like that other chicken." She agrees and then trains him to run in the Kentucky Derby, the following year. "Old Pecker" wins the race by twelve lengths.***

**********

* Both tears and other precious bodily fluids.

** Even better than Capt. Crunch and miles above Cream of Kale

*** I had a whole slew of jokes about randy Eskimos, but the staff vetoed them on moral grounds.

Cakey the Clown Loves Chitti

2011-02-23T23:20:00.003-06:00

Well,this is either good news or an unfortunate development (which is why it belongs on this blog), depending on your point of view. Cakey the Jacked-Up Clown has a brand new talk show airing on BBC5. In the very first episode, he interviews the robot star of the blockbuster, Tamil-language film, Enthiran. Here is the illegal, pirated, bootleg footage that I smuggled out of the BBC5 offices on a DVR tape of that very interview:

I trust you found some way to either enjoy that or stomach it.

Yours,

Nuffy Noe

Perfection

2011-02-23T02:11:00.001-06:00

We pause for this brief commercial interruption:

We now return you to your regularly scheduled internet.

Thank you,

Nuffy Noe

Academy Awards Nomination FAIL

2011-02-21T18:26:00.012-06:00

I just want to vent a little bit about the continued failure of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. I know the nominations for this year's Academy Awards have been out for a long time now, and I've had plenty of time to get over it. But, goshdarnit, I'm not over it! The wrong movies were nominated, I tell's ya's! The King's Speech? Yawn! 127 Hours? Yeah, that's about how long the movie felt while watching it! Black Swan? More like Diarrhea on Celluloid! True Grit? More like True Sh--I can't even say it! The FCC is breathing down my neck.

"Well, who exactly do you think should've been nominated, Nuffy Noe?" you ask, left eyebrow cocked at a surly angle. I'll never understand why you ask questions when you already know the answer, but since you insist on feigning ignorance, I will discuss the matter one last time. Please take notes.

Of course, the sole nominee and guaranteed winner of the 83rd Annual Academy Awards should be.....(insert drum roll here)...Enthiran! That's right, the Kollywood masterpiece of pathos, romance, turgid events, music and robots! Enthiran put everything Hollywood has ever done to shame forever. I mean, just think about your hideous Rooster Cogburns, your stuttering potentates and your toenail-busting ballet creeps, and then compare them to this too-cool dude:

Oh, you haven't heard of this movie Enthiran? Seriously? I find that hard to believe. Of all the Kollywood films you've watched this year, you're gonna sit there and tell me that Enthiran somehow slipped under your radar? It's only the most expensive Tamil language film ever made! Get with the program, Northover!

Enthiran is the story of India's first sentient robot. He speaks stilted English intermingled with luscious Tamil. He dances, he sings, he gets a white skunk-stripe down the middle of his hair, he learns to love, he multiplies and turns into a 1) sphere, 2) snake, 3) drill, 4) giant robot made of tiny robots, and his name is Chitti. Seriously, does your puny Terminator hold a candle to my multi-robot snake Chitti? No, he does not. He is a Ziploc bag full of vomit, pepper, diarrhea and fail compared to my Chitti. Oh, my Chitti....hang on, I might be fainting....

Okay, I'm better. Snorted a pinch of chili powder and it perked me right up. I intend to keep talking about Enthiran forever. That's how much I want to nibble on the DVD when I think about it. If it doesn't win every single motion picture related award the universe has ever devised, I will go on a rampage through Bensonhurst with a tire iron, a bag of marbles and a mysterious hat.

THIS, people:

NOT this:
And THIS example of chaste womanly virtue:

Not THIS pile of nightmare:

It's about time Hollywood recognized movies about Tamil-speaking robots who learn to love, become jealous, replicate themselves, form into massive snake shapes and attack the Indian army. It's about time. If not this year, Academy, then when? WHEN?

With love,

Nuffy Noe

P.S. -- I leave you with a succulent morsel. You can thank me later.

How to Talk to Girls

2011-02-21T00:39:00.002-06:00

For those of you still recovering from a lonely Valentine's Day, nine-year-old author Alec Greven offers sage advice for how to communicate with the opposite sex.

Oh, you may laugh, but this young man is a published author!

The Epic Life of a Glorious Madman

2011-02-13T18:25:00.004-06:00

Yes, that is the title of my current novel, a mammoth biography coming soon to an internet book wholesaler near you. The Epic Life of a Glorious Madman. It is a book that will pierce the flesh between your eyes with every single paragraph. Finely crafted sentences give way to chapters like rough cut diamonds clawed out of the diatomaceous earth. 1,207 pages of single spaced, 10-point Arial font (with the occasional use of Jokerman font for effect).

Who is the glorious madman that has earned these 520,000 words of gorgeous prose? I think you know. A giant among actors, a king among men, a shining jewel among the cubic zirconia. A Tiffany Vase among the Indonesia-imported Hobby Lobby tureens. A veritable Disneyland among the county fairs. Are you following my metaphors?

Yes, I am talking about none other than Mark Northover, He Who Shall Never Be Forgotten. On the off chance that you never watch movies, never turn on the television and have never heard of a single actor in the entire history of the motion picture industry, let me give you a quick overview of the career highlights of Sir Mark Northover: 1988 - Willow (yes, the epic fantasy masterpiece by George Lucas, Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese), 1990 - Mack the Knife (a revisionist neo-noir thriller that won multiple awards, directed by the fabulous Menahem Golan), 1991 - The Doors (masterpiece, award winning, box office smash, history in the making, a film about Jim Morrison and his many odors). Need I go on?

You can understand why Mark Northover deserves the epic treatment of my doorstop-heavy biography. I mean, just look at the man. His very demeanor exudes legend.

So, to tantalize you with bite sized morsels, here are some of the sordid details that I cover in the course of my Longer-Than-A-Stephen-King-Novel novel:

1) Mark Northover's six month stint in Chino for knifing the corrupt son of a Los Angeles selectman during an attempted arson attack on a furniture factory. The conviction was later overturned when a jury realized that Mark Northover was saving the lives of fifty orphans who were trapped in the break room of the factory.

2) Mark Northover's legendary appearance at Carnegie Hall in 1977. Includes all the gory details about Bob Hope's rampage in the dressing room with a bottle of Boone's Farm wine, a young Tom Selleck rushing the stage to kiss Mark's face during the intermission, and the performing mule that broke loose of its chain and tried to trample the backup dancers.

3) 1991, the year Mark Northover hosted the Villie's (East Village's version of the Oscars). His touching monologue on the subject of diarrheabedis, and all those celebrities lost to this tragic disease, brought the usually reserved Danny Devito to tears.

Now, if those tasty bits are not enough to get you to buy the book, then let me add one further enticement. This book will be personally endorsed by Billy Barty. At least, I hope it will be. I am attempting to locate him as we speak. I am fairly certain he will endorse it. In fact, I have it from a reliable source that if I can locate him and make my pitch, he will be 100% percent behind it.

I hope you wait with baited breath. I know I do.

As Always,

Nuffy Noe

Playing Asteroids for Real

2011-02-10T15:21:00.001-06:00

Depending on who you believe, the earth faces one of the following two possibilities:

1. The earth is in for a near miss in 2036 from a 900-foot long asteroid named Apophis
2. We're doomed! DOOMED I tell you!!

The first viewpoint is held by NASA. A few years ago they declared that the Earth was in serious risk of colliding with the asteroid in 2029. (This experience was reportedly the basis for the famous Bud Light commercial - though in real life they downed a whole bunch of Stella Artois and brie cheese.) However, after recalculating, getting their metric and standard people on one measurement system, and double-checking their U.S. Government surplus tape measure for warping, they changed their minds and declared that everything's cool. As far as NASA is concerned, Apophis is like the average hitchhiker on an interstate exit ramp: grubby, frightening, but passing out of sight as quickly as it comes into view.

Meanwhile, the second, "doomed" viewpoint is held be Russian scientists, who think there is a very good chance Apophis will hit a "gravitational keyhole*" in 2029, which will put the asteroid on a collision course with the earth in 2036. When asked where the asteroid would hit the earth, Russian scientists replied that considering current global trends and the odds, the consensus was on Detroit, Michigan.

NASA replied that the Russian scientists were exaggerating the chances of a collision, most likely as a prank to convince President Putin to leave the planet. NASA claims there is only a 1 in 250,000 chance that the collision scenario will happen. When asked for a real world example of those kinds of odds, a NASA spokesperson replied, "Oh, you know, about the chance that New Orleans will win the Super Bowl, the Boston Red Sox will win the World Series twice, and that the U.S. would have an African-American President all in the same decade." After a highly professional spit-take, she admitted those calculations were based on a 2003 research paper, commissioned by then Senator Joe Biden.

Regardless of who's right**, what is clear is that the earth needs a plan for defense. We can't just sit back and let any little punk asteroid who gets his hands on a gravitational keyhole crash his way into the Motor City, regardless of whether or not people would classify the results as "urban inprovement."

NASA and others are considering this very matter and devising what they call "earth protection strategies." Now, I know this sounds like a new kind of Geico policy, or a service your local mobsters offer ("Awfully nice planet you got there. It'd be a shame if anything happened to it.") In reality, it is actually a selection of tactics designed to redirect asteroids and other heavenly bodies to the shabbier, unpopulated parts of the solar system.

Most of these strategies are all very complex and subtle efforts to make minute but meaningful changes in the asteroid's trajectory. Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking that instead of subtle, "reasonable" approaches, we need a real world version of the game Asteroids. You're thinking NASA needs to build a giant rotating spaceship with a massive cannon that can blast asteroids into a thousand pieces. You're even thinking that the cannon should make that "PWWW" sound when it fires.

I had that very same thought, and wasted half an hour making the "PWWW" noise while shooting imaginary space rocks with my finger. The only thing this accomplished was to highly agitate our dog.

Well, unfortunately, a giant space cannon can't make that "PWWW" noise, because there's no noise in space. The other main problem with this strategy is that, just as in the video game, when you start blowing up asteroids into bunches of pieces, those pieces fly around and create all kinds of havoc. By "havoc" I mean blowing up the giant space cannon and everyone sitting in it going "PWWW!" Remember what a pain that was in the game?

Also, flying saucers might show up and start shooting at the ship. Those guys have superior technology. Let's not piss them off until we get our overall weapons systems up to say, Star Trek levels.

No, the subtle methods are best, as boring and explosion-free as they are. However, the methods that scientists are currently proposing strike me as a whole lot of investment for uncertain results. Gravity, photon pressure, and playful nudges with a spacecraft all sound highly rational and make for terrific conversation around the geekier water coolers at Cape Kennedy, but asteroids are tricky, unreliable, rock-headed little jerks. We need methods that take their obvious character flaws into account.

Plus, what happens if our efforts only succeed in diverting the asteroid right into that gravitational keyhole***? It'd be just like a cosmic episode of I Love Lucy.

So allow me to conclude this post with my own modest contribution to the effort to save our planet.The good people at NASA can feel free to call me about these, if they need help with the details, or if they want an autographed copy.

Earl Fando's strategies for diverting an asteroid.

1. Large "Detour" sign in Esperanto
2. Launch Chuck Norris into space to take the asteroid out permanently
3. Giant ACME magnet
4. Point out how lovely Mars is and wouldn't you like to collide with it instead?
5. Confuse asteroid with David Blaine's card tricks and creepy personality
6. Work out a deal with the flying saucer aliens and have them take out the asteroid and deal with the rubble blowback
7. Position Major League batting champs on the International Space Station with really, REALLY big bats
8. Block it with the Moon (Sorry, Moon!)
9. Auto-tune the asteroid into a different key (isn't that how auto-tune works? It must have some useful purpose!)
10. Launch the Cookie Monster into space to eat the asteroid
11. Taze the asteroid into submission
12. Have David Beckham bend a few free kicks at the asteroid
13. Apply mathematics from national debt calculations to create a space-time wormhole, and push the asteroid through it
14. Scare off asteroid with a giant picture of a skunk
15. Scare off asteroid with a giant picture of a skank
16. Scare off asteroid with a giant picture of a skink (I can keep up this sort of thing all day.)
17. Create a massive gravitational disturbance in the asteroid's path by launching Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak's assets into space
18. Lure the asteroid with $5 foot-long specials at new Subway on Pluto
19. Giant "Game Over" sign that will cause the asteroid to disappear

* Not a euphemism, surprisingly
** And, as David Letterman used to say, "It's not a competition, so no wagering."
*** I admit it. I like the expression "gravitational keyhole." It's a lot of fun to write and say. Try working it into your own personal conversations!

The Super Bowl Party to End All Super Bowl Parties

2011-02-08T21:54:00.007-06:00

I can't stop remembering the glorious experience that was Super Bowl XLV. So many bright lights, so many bone-crunching moments, the screams, the popcorn, the explosions, the field goals. I wake up in the middle of the morning with terrible, half-formed dream images of shoulder pads smacking into faces and femurs snapping like old brittle plastic straws.

I put seventeen dollars on the game. Sadly, I lost it all. Betting on the Steelers, you suppose? Nay! I bet on the possibility that the Cowboys would rush the field and try to take back their stadium from the carpetbaggers. I know it's an unlikely scenario, but it would have paid out a thousand and six to one if it had happened. Sadly--some might say, tragically--that did not happen. Instead, we had a regular old football game, and the Packers stabbed their way to glory.

It's okay, though. I'm not upset anymore about the lost money. I had the time of my life at Ethel Pewpsley's Super Bowl party. Ethel is my cousin's step-grandmother twice removed. She lives at the other end of the cul-de-sac in the split level, ranch-style home with the tree stump out front that she carved into the shape of an exploding cow's head using only a chisel, bent spoon and some hydrochloric acid.

It was a phenomenal party. Tony was there, Frank, John Mustard, Ardmore Annis, Jason Perry. There might have been a couple of those rascally Ghirardelli twins. I glimpsed Tony Dow, Jerry Mathers and quite possibly a Gary Coleman look-alike in a red wig and sunglasses (I didn't get a good look at him. He spent most of the evening hiding behind the divan, eating chips). Also, a very small chimpanzee was set loose in the den and kicked a bunch of people with his stumpy chimp feet.

Ethel had a flat screen TV in every single room of the house, the bathrooms, the garage, out in the backyard, in the alcove behind the copper statue of Larry David, and every single set was tuned to the game (except the alcove TV which was showing old episodes of Lancelot Link Secret Chimp. I assume that was for the chimp in the den, but he was too busy kicking people in the head/neck).

The buffet was spread out on card tables in the hallway. Oh, the food. Thank you, food. I recall the gravies, the heaping hot platters of boiled and buttered peas, the vast aluminum trays full of smoked meats and gristles, the ginormous pyrex dishes filled with multi-layered casseroles and various bean dips, the fried items wrapped in tin foil, the baked stuff hidden under Tupperware lids, the savory substances that sizzled when you thought about them. I recall piling my plate high with taters steeped in seven fluids, vegetable medleys soaked in brine and sea foam. I enjoyed a delicate chalice of bacon squeezings and lime. I ate until I forgot my own name.

And, of course, we watched the game. In between sessions of bloated belly aches, I saw the Packers do the impossible: succeed. They spiked footballs into the face parts of the other team, danced over people like vapors swirling up from subway grates. They flew on wings like pegasuseses. It was a glorious evening.

In the end, however, the danged chimpanzee sent us all to the local clinic, where they treated our various bruises, scrapes, broken bones, chipped teeth and toenail slashes. Next year, let's not invite the chimpanzee.

The Mother of All Super Bowl Commercials

2011-02-06T01:20:00.002-06:00

It's Super Bowl time again, and soon people will be huddled around their big screen, high-definition televisions, eagerly watching the dazzling footwork and skill of talented performers who are at the peak of their careers.

That's right, they'll be watching Super Bowl ads! Every year the big game plays second banana to the big-budget television commercials that pay the bills for the NFL and whatever network is covering the game. (Next year, I hear it's HGTV's turn - bet the field will look nice!) These commercials are sometimes entertaining, sometimes amusing, and frequently neither. However, they still manage to distract people from the most important part of the event, the Super Bowl halftime show.

Also, there is the game, of course.

Instead of constantly being distracted by the subtle ploys of market research, advertisers should just get together and come up with one commercial, a mega commercial, a commercial to end all commercials, a super Super Bowl commercial.

I wonder what that would be like...

**********

[EXT. DAY. Mid morning. An open field in the prairie. Two laconic cowboys are leaning up against fence, watching two powerful looking groups of Budweiser horses run onto the field.]

COWBOY 1: Well, looks like the game's fixin' to start.

COWBOY 2: Yup.

[On the sidelines, a group of Victoria's Secret models, dressed in skimpy lingerie, are cheer-leading. The head cheerleader is Danica Patrick, completely naked except for a sandwich board that covers her front and back and reads "Who's Your Go Daddy?"]

COWBOY 1: Hot Cheerleaders.

COWBOY 2: Yup.

[The horses line up for the kickoff. They rush forward as the ball flies into the air. Suddenly the football game is interrupted by cargo planes and parachuting Chick Fil-A cows. As the cows descend, they throw down backpacks that explode as they strike the ground. Thousands of Doritos fly out of the exploding backpacks.
Some of the Doritos hit the cowboys in the face.]

COWBOY 1: (Chewing on a Dorito) Chicken-flavored Doritos.

COWBOY 2: (Spitting out a mouthful of Doritos) Yup.

[The game resumes with one of the horses snapping the ball to Betty White, who is riding another horse. She quickly devours a Snickers bar and uses the energy to leap on to the back of a rushing stallion. She then ties a Bud Light to the football and throws it down field. Cedric the Entertainer is lackadaisically running a route down the sideline when he spies the Bud Light. He breaks into a remarkable sprint, diving for the catch, when suddenly he is knocked out of the way by a speeding Toyota Prius. On the back of the Prius, the Geico Gecko is in the middle of a light saber duel with Yoda from Star Wars.]

COWBOY 1: Didn't see that one comin'.

COWBOY 2: Nope.

[Back on the Prius, The Gecko and Yoda continue their duel, mixing back flips with insurance advice. Around them are several unnecessary explosions.]

YODA: Silly your commercials are! Nothing have I learned about insurance policies!

[Suddenly, The Most Interesting Man in the World jumps a motorcycle through three rings of fire. As he passes, the Geico Gecko back flips onto his motorcycle.]

GEICO GECKO: (Shouting) Have you forgotten about Geico's motorcycle insurance?

[The Old Spice Guy rides by on a souped up Segway, and Yoda jumps on. They pursue the motorcycle with the Most Interesting Man in the World and the Geico Gecko. In the background are several dinosaurs and a tornado.]

YODA: Nothing about rates you have said! Discounts I am interested in!

[Cut to The Progressive Insurance warehouse store. Flo, the insurance spokeswoman, is facing the camera and smiling.]

FLO: Are you a Jedi master? Discount! (Chime sound)

[Suddenly, the Burger King runs up, wearing nothing but Speedos and black socks. He stuffs Flo into a gunney sack and runs off with her.]

FLO: (Muffled from inside bag) Creepy kidnapper. Discount! (Muffled chime sound)

[Cut back to the cowboys.]

COWBOY 1: That was kinda surreal.

COWBOY 2: Yup.

[Cut back to the speeding motorcycle and Segway. The motorcycle crashes through a store display of Coke. The Segway smashes through a similar display of Pepsi. Both displays explode behind the speeding vehicles.]

MOST INTERESTING MAN IN THE WORLD: (Sipping a Coke while driving the motorcycle) Now, when I'm not drinking beer, this is usually what I'm having!

YODA: (Sips a Pepsi) MMMMMMMM-MMM-MMM-MMM!!!!!!!!

[Suddenly, a green Volkswagen Beetle drives by and the Gecko and Yoda back-flip on to it. A nuclear explosion is in the background.]

COWBOY 1: (Punching COWBOY 2 on the arm) Green one.

COWBOY 2: (Casually glancing at his arm)Yup.

[The Gecko and Yoda continue their battle when suddenly Yoda looks through the sun roof of the VW and realizes, to his horror, that the car is being driven by the "mayhem" guy from the Allstate commercials. The Mayhem guy looks up at Yoda and smiles a terrible smile. He is smoking a large cigar.]

YODA: In for it, we are!

ALLSTATE MAYHEM GUY: I'm your private driver, but what you don't know is that I'm also obsessed with Bigfoot.

[Cut to a shot of Bigfoot, sitting in the end zone, eating a bag of Jack's Links Beef Jerky.]

ALLSTATE MAYHEM GUY: So, when I see a Sasquatch sitting in the middle of an open field. I can't help but head right for him. (Switches gears and floors it)

GEICO GECKO: I've got a bad feeling about this.

[The car crashes into Bigfoot like he was a brick wall. The Gecko and Yoda are hurtled through the air to a hard landing on the ground. The VW Bug explodes. The football with the Bud Light lands in Yoda's hands.]

YODA: Down-touch made have I!

[Cut to Betty White kissing her bicep.]

[Cut to Danica Patrick peeling off her sandwich board covering, revealing a smaller sandwich board underneath that reads "To be continued online, suckers!"]

[Cut to the Chick-Fil-A cows, line dancing with the Budweiser horses.]

[Cut to The Most Interesting Man in the World, the Old Spice Guy, and Flo, sharing an elaborate cocktail with three straws. The Burger King is stuffed in a garbage can in the background.]

[Cut to William Shatner, against an obvious green screen background containing an image of shirtless football fans. Shatner is doing karate chops as the "Priceline Negotiator."]

[Cut to Yoda with the football and Bud Light, suddenly being tackled by an enraged Cedric the Entertainer. Cedric grabs the Bud Light, rips the cap off, and downs it.]

[Cut back to the cowboys, watching it all.]

COWBOY 1: Happens every year.

COWBOY 2: (Pause) I gotta go pee.

COWBOY 1: Better hurry. The commercial's almost over.

2010, Your Best Year

2011-02-05T14:07:00.004-06:00

Ladies and germs, I'm sorry to break the news to you, but it's official. 2010 was your best year. The result of weeks of scientific study, lab tests and generous heaps of polling data make it clear. You accomplished more, enjoyed more soda and cake, capered more freely and had more decent conversations in 2010 than in any previous year. The hard data: your family annoyed you 3% less in 2010 than in 2009, your shoes fit 1.3% more snugly than those ratty sneakers you wore from September 2007 until August of 2009, and you went to the circus an average of .5 times.

Dr. Sanjib Viktay of Petterstown University-Ranjni is quoted in the Sana Morning Town News as gravely intoning, "The result of these one million man hours of intensive research are surprising. It clears up for us many assumptions about how poorly you fared in 2010, and hopefully the publication of these details will go far to drive out the misconception people have that you were on a downward trend in life, both personally, financially and psycho-emotionally."

The researchers point to key moments in 2010 as indicators of the overall superiority of your experiences:

1) Your neighbor accidentally mowed part of your lawn on three separate occasions, saving you an estimated 5.3 minutes of combined work.

2) The waiter at Olive Garden undercharged you by five cents on that pasta primavera you enjoyed in April. Contrast that with the fifteen cent overcharge you suffered in 2009 at Bloth Family Pharmacy on your order of scar lightening cream.

3) You found seven pennies over the course of the year and picked up five of them. Compare that with the four pennies you found in 2009 and the one you picked up that had streptococcus bacilli living in the grooves of Lincoln's beard. Yes, that's how you got strep in 2009.

4) Your significant other made fun of you behind your back 24% fewer times in 2010 than in 2009.

5) That Nigerian Prince who e-mailed you in March of 2010 about the $25 million that he wanted to transfer to you if you would first cover the transfer cost of $2500? Believe it or not, he was legitimate. Even if you didn't take him up on the offer, this is still considered (from a scientific viewpoint) better than the five fake Nigerian Princes who tried to scam you in 2009.

6) You finally excreted out the intestinal worms you picked up on your trip to Mexico in 2005. Yes, you were entirely unaware of the worms, but it still happened. You picked up the worms from eating that street taco in Piedras Negras, and they had been multiplying in your colon ever since and making you more prone to sickness. Good news, they finally left your system on October 12, 2010.

With this hard data in hand, I hope you will finally quit complaining about 2010 and also cease looking forward to 2011. As Dr. and Mrs. Plenthil Fhant write in the Berkeley Journal of Notice, "2011 and the years to follow are unlikely to be any good for you. Find a way to enjoy them by lowering your expectations and possibly writing a book about the best year of your life, 2010." With this reasonable attitude in mind, you can probably find a way to enjoy 2011. Salut!

Yours Truly,

nuffy noe

The Best of DoUI for 2010

2011-02-05T12:17:00.001-06:00

Once again it's time for us to toot our horns. (That was a relief! Memo to self, skip the staff chili breakfasts from now on.)

It's also time for a review of the bits, posts, and random keyboard strikes that we've chosen as our best for the year. I should say, mostly MY best, as Nuffy and Stew have been more intermittent, having better things to do like golfing, writing great American screenplays, and watching episodes of 24 in high-definition television.

**********

The Top 10

Five Years Older - Nuffy comments on our fifth anniversary. At least that's what we think he was writing about.
Goodness Is Out, The Chin Is In - Chins can be cruel sometimes.
Even More Academy Bestness! - Earl's annual review of the Oscar Best Picture nominees. They always seem weirder in print.
Olympic Update - Stew posts about the Olympics. Hell, Stew posts, period!
Comforting Words for the Unwise - You'd think at a funeral there's not a lot you could say that would offend the deceased. Apparently, there is.
France Surrenders! - In the 2010 World Cup, just in case you were worried that Andorra had gone all Nazi.
Somebody Cut Me on Purpose! - All the personal details from Earl's hernia surgery, because we know you want them.
The Most Interesting Man in the World - Outtakes - Sure he can feed mountain eagles and cliff dive, but with a life like that he's going to be easily distracted.
Electric Nose Hair Trimmer? I Thought that Was the Turn Signal! - They're putting all sorts of things in luxury cars these days, whether you want them or not.
Return of the Original Best Thing Ever - The Great American Screenplay,Nuffy-style!

**********

The Best of the Rest

On This Day - The stories behind the innocuous, dull, mind-numbingly boring historical tidbits.
Scorin' Warren - According to Peter Biskind, Warren Beatty was always on the make. As Groucho once said of Harpo, "He does better in his sleep than I do awake."
How to Annoy People - Part 767 - Tips on how to make people want to throttle you. Guaranteed to inspire violent nervous breakdowns or derisive ridicule.
Nothing Is Funny, A Lament for Conan O'Brien -Nuffy discusses the Conan/Jay imbroglio. Unfortunately, he doesn't offer us a definition as to what an "imbroglio" is.
Now That's a Warm Bed! - Hotels are experimenting with human "bed-warmers." Admittedly, that's better than "bed-wetters."
The Incredible Lobster Bisque! - Soup is not only good food, it can do 100 chin-ups in a single sitting.
Missin' Cakey - Four words: cartoon, Cakey the Clown. It's irresistible, just like a train wreck.
Nashville, Here I Come! - Earl pens country music titles. Yeah, like that's hard.
Super Bowl Surprises - Lots of things happen during the Super Bowl and we don't always catch all of them.
A Valentine's Day Greetings - Cakey the Clown hearts you. No, that's not some disgusting sex act... sheesh ...you people, sometimes!
Valentine's Day Advice Worth Ignoring - There's nothing quite so touchingly sincere as personal advice from celebrities as part of movie promotions.
Bum-Bum-Da-Bum-Bum, Bum-Bum-Da-Bum-Bum - The Winter Olympics! Yeah, we know, but it was nearby in Canada.
It's All Downhill for the Lynx - Animal competitors at the Olympics! (Well, besides Bode Miller.)
Shatner Gold... Olympic Gold - William Shatner was part of the official Olympic ceremonies. Well, of course he was!
Five Times Better Live Blog - Nuffy Noe live blogged the Oscars for us last year. At least, we think it was the Oscars.
HOLY HORSE GRENADES! Up at last! - More of Nuffy's Oscar blogging from the cheap seats, supposedly.
Ick! - The Oscar blogging intrigue gets even more interesting. For example, just what exactly has Jack Nicholson been eating?
Getting April Fool's Day Right - Because we know you care as much as we do.
Things Star Trek Can Teach NASA - Let's face it, the folks at NASA need all the help they can get these days.
Adult Soccer League - No, it's not what your thinking, you pervs.
Vuvuzela Nightmare - We can still hear them.
I Can Has Nausea - The end of Western Civilization? Well, the end of our lunches in our stomachs, that's for sure.
Salt, Is There Anything It Can't Do? Redux - Salt, the other white meat.
No Ma'am, I Never Meant to Rock You at All - What if famous rock lyrics were retracted? Yeah, but it killed 20 minutes on Twitter.
An Unfortunate Earful - The Most Interesting Man Outtakes, in audio form! Just because we can!
New for Oktoberfest! Pigs so Hot They'll Melt Your Face Off! - The title tells the story just fine, but did we mention there's cannibalism too?
Maybe We Should Have Named the School "American University?" - Higher Education marketing is harder than it looks.
You Never Know What'll Happen in Politics! - But if you guessed something really nutty, congratulations!
And Yet No Farther than a Won-Ton's Bird - Behold the noble Thanksgiving turkey! And then there's the one we're serving...
Is There Anybody Out There? - NASA takes a step closer to finding extraterrestrial life, or livening up press conferences

Being Dainty

2011-02-02T23:14:00.003-06:00

There is nothing wrong with being dainty. Yeah, you heard me. I'm not afeared to say it. I mean, seriously, someone needs to finally say it, and I am the one. There is nothing wrong with being dainty. Dainty is the new sarcastic. Sarcastic is soooooo 2007. Dainty is where it's at.

Now, having said that, and assuming you have all accepted my premise, let's talk about the qualities of being dainty. After all, it is a virtual certainty at this point that you will want to go out and practice being dainty. Get ahead of this trend, folks, before it passes you by. Don't wait for the bus driver or the mail carrier or the gong farmer to start being dainty before you hop on this best band wagon of all time.

Five tips for being dainty:

1) Stick that dang pinky finger out whilst sipping your tea. There is no good reason to keep the tiniest and lamest finger of all curled around the handle as if you needed its help to hold up the cup. Stick it straight out for all the world to see. That is dainty.

2) Tiptoes. There is no law obligating you to use the entire bottom of the foot when walking. It's just a ridiculous assumption that people make. "Oh," they say, "I have a heel, an arch, a ball of the foot and the pads of my toes. I'd better make sure every single one of those things touches the ground every time I take a step." Stop it! Just stop it! Only the front half of your foot should ever come into contact with the ground. Dainty people around the world already know and accept this.

3) Prancing. I do not, for the life of me, understand what everyone has got against prancing. People go out dancing, they spend a ton of money romancing, but where's all the prancing? Would the world really be a worse place if more people pranced now and again? I highly doubt it. Set out a block of time each afternoon to prance. You can prance in your backyard, on the sidewalk, in an open field somewhere, in your local park, or just right there in your dusty old drab living room full of kitsch paintings and tapestries.

4) Be impressed with unimpressive things. You read that right, dummy. You know how you act when you are genuinely impressed by something? Eyes wide, gasping noises, oohing and aahing, clapping your hands, taking an anxious step back. We all do these things when we're impressed, but now try doing them when you are not impressed. The next time a completely boring and uninteresting thing happens, exaggerate being impressed by it. People will know that you are dainty and never get over it.

5) Jingle bells on your clothes. Oh man, talk about the tenth level of dainty. This is it, stupids. You can buy whole bags of tiny, silver jingle bells at your nearest Christmas store or hobby shop. Get some clear thread and a sewing needle and attach those jingle bells to the hem of your garment, to the elbows of your sleeves, to the corners of your collar, to the ends of your shoelaces, to the butt of your jeans, whatever it takes. When you walk, it should sound like a Christmas nightmare breaking through the wall of sleep and vomiting itself into the real world like a Lovecraftian ooze.

If you can at least put these five things into practice, you will be well on your way to becoming fully and completely dainty. Get ahead of the trend before it's too late. Remember how you didn't get into the macarena until it was six months past being cool? Don't make that same mistake again. Be dainty today!

Your friend,

Nuffy Noe

VH1: Behind the Music - Infamous Moments in Rap

2011-02-01T00:32:00.001-06:00

Highlights from the "lost" episode of VH1: Behind the Music.

[Self consciously hip music, accompanied by blurred shots of drugged out hippie musicians arguing, a well-dressed rock producer snorting coke, and Ozzy Osbourne riding a llama through a Whole Foods outlet]

NARRATOR: Tonight on VH1: Behind the Music: The genre of hip hop and particularly rap has taken the music industry by storm, evolving into a multi-billion dollar industry, and catapulting dozens of artists to stardom, regardless of their complete inability to sing, play an instrument, or figure out how to download their own songs from iTunes.

Yet, rap music has not been without its scandals and tragedies. No, not the violence, shootings, or sex scandals. Face it, that's the kind of news that music publicists would kill for and have repeatedly. No, tonight we look at the really sordid moments when rap failed to live up to its raw, naked idealism. Tonight, the most infamous moments in the history of rap music itself.

[Title: VH1: Behind the Music - The Most Infamous Moments in Rap Music (No, Seriously Man, These Are Bad)]

**********

NARRATOR: The year was 1968 and rap hadn't even been invented yet. Somehow though, a young Jewish-Canadian actor managed to synthesize traditional African storytelling techniques, rhythmically dramatic poetry readings, and funky jazz. His name was William Shatner.

[Archival footage of Gene Roddenberry]

GENE RODDENBERRY: No one understood Bill Shatner's The Transfigured Man. Music critics didn't understand it. Musicians didn't grasp its significance. Hell, I thought he was smoking dope when I first heard it. Later on though, when the rap scene became prominent, we all understood.

[Rapper LL Cool J, sitting in a jacuzzi, wearing a mink fedora, sipping a large McDonald's drink]

LL COOL J: Shatner was fly, man. If his rendition of Mr. Tambourine Man had a sweet hip-hop groove behind it, it would go platinum today.

NARRATOR: Tragically though, it didn't, and scandalously, to this day, people think rap was invented by inner-city DJs.

**********

NARRATOR: For awhile it seemed like anyone could put out a rap album, and many did.

[Christopher Walken in a studio in front of a mic. He is wearing a bright white sweatsuit, a backwards baseball cap, a variety of chains, and a large novelty watch on a necklace. Several of his teeth are gold-capped.]

CHRISTOPHER WALKEN: My name is Chris and I have to say, that I find it rather hard to talk this way.

[Betty White in a studio in front of a mic. She is wearing the same exact outfit that Walken wore, including the gold teeth.]

BETTY WHITE: I might be old and wrinkly but this granny ain't no sucker. I'm high on Geritol and I'm a mean mutha [expletive deleted].

[Julia Child in a studio in front of a mic. She is wearing a gold-plated chef's hat and an apron with the words "Saucy Wench" spelled out in rhinestones on the front.]

NARRATOR: Etc., etc.

**********

NARRATOR: In 2005, the White House turned to rap in an effort to answer criticism about the government's response to Hurricane Katrina. Only a few cuts from the planned album survive. One was from a number titled "Sorry 'bout That Big Easy."

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH - I never meant for floodin' or for the city to crumble.
Baby, you know this was a bipartisan bumble.
If I wanted New Orleans gone, if I had wanted it to pass,
I'd have sent a B2 bomber and just JDAM-med your ass.

VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY: JDAM-med your ass!

GRANDMASTER FLASH: A lot of people have asked how they got those terrific low beats on the track, but it was really just Cheney pounding his chest to restart his heart between doing vocal beats. It turns out, people loved the sound so much, it's been sampled on over 250 rap tunes. Cheney didn't run for office because he's getting so much work as a hip-hop producer these days. He has to work under a pseudonym though: DJ Racy Pacemaker.

NARRATOR: President Barack Obama also toyed with the idea of using rap to communicate with the masses.

ICE CUBE: President Obama tried hard but it didn't work out. He kept wanting to go into his familiar speech rhythm, but the teleprompter couldn't keep up with the beat. Eventually it overheated, caught fire, and gave out. The poor guy got so confused, he broke out into an off-key version of Tiny Bubbles.

**********

NARRATOR: Many actors and actresses tried their hand at rap music, but no one ever tapped into the scene with an authentic sound, with one exception: Meryl Streep.

DJ JAZZY JEFF: After her usual rigorous research and vocal training, she did such a good job her album sold 2,000,000 copies. Everyone thought it was a Snoop Dogg release.

NARRATOR: Even Snoop was convinced.

SNOOP DOGG: Damn man, I musta been stoned cold outta my mind when I did that record, cause I don't remember it at all.

My Ten Favorite Odors

2011-01-23T17:50:00.002-06:00

1. hippopotamus skin
2. really old dirt
3. ape breath
4. boiling mayonnaise
5. fresh tires
6. celebrity cologne
7. burned wheat
8. fabulous air
9. two day old shirt
10. tainted oxygen

Just thought I ought to share.

Sincerely,

Nuffy Noe, Friend of the Earth

What the Advertisemensts REALLY Taught Me

2011-01-22T23:39:00.002-06:00

In order to keep up with current events, and also because our recliner is veeerrry comfy, I watch a fair amount of television. Which means I also watch a lot of advertisements. Love them or hate them, one thing about commercials, or "adverts" as they are known in Tahiti*, is that they are all designed to convey a specific message: "Buy our product!"

This is a simple and straightforward message. (Duh.) However, since ads need to be clever and interesting to gain our attention, the writers invariably present us with a plethora of other messages, many of them unintentional. I never fail to learn just a little bit more about our sordid world from a TV commercial. Here are just a few things I've learned from advertisers in the last year.

Bud Light - Some alcoholics will do anything for free lite beer. Here we go!
Jack's Links - Caution: This product may make you recklessly stupid around giant mythical primates.
Geico Insurance - Geckos are magical lizards that can talk and produce wallets and cellphones out of thin air. Who needs insurance with them around?! (Also, cavemen suck.)
Butterfingers - People who eat Butterfingers are selfish *****s who would rather let you starve than share a measly crumb or two from their little candy bar.
ESPN Sportscenter - The reason you never see your favorite athletes on the street is because they all hang out in Bristol, Connecticut. The sports bars there must do terrific business.
E*Trade - Babies are mouthy little bastards, but man, can they play the market.
Cialis - Sexual arousal can cause you to hallucinate that your home has turned into nature. (Also, older people are a lot hornier than most young people suspect.)
Volkswagen - It's acceptable to hurt people when you see a Volkswagen. (I blame the Nazis for this.)
Twix - Guys, are you a lying, no-good, skeez? She'll never know, as long as you have a Twix candy bar handy.
Orkin - Giant mutant bugs are going to take over the earth. They can drive cars and deliver pizzas. Soon they'll be able to wield firearms, and then even your Orkin man won't stand a chance.
Burger King - That weird, perverted guy you remember from high school? He finally managed to grow a beard and became king of all burgers!
Allstate - All of your auto damage has been caused by Liz Lemon's old boyfriend. Why don't we all sue him?
Charmin - Cartoon bears are chronic sufferers of dingle berries. This explains why Hanna Barbera never showed Yogi from the rear.
Apple - Apple thinks that all us Windows users are four-eyed doofuses who can't see why their trendy, hipster computers are overpriced.
Windows - Windows was invented by everyone, which explains the bugs.
Dos Equis - The rest of us are way too uncool to drink Dos Equis. Stick to your Buds and Millers you uninteresting proles!
Old Spice Deodorant - Again, too cool for us. Right Guard and Sure for the ladies (and the generic stuff I use because everything else burns my pits and I can't put my arms down and ... well, you get the picture.)
Progressive - All of our insurance is sold by a single gabby woman in a giant, sterile supermarket.
Discover Card - Never, ever, go on a blind date with an Eastern European woman named "Peggy." For one thing, you'll never be able to get her to call you back.
Snickers - Without a Snickers bar, you will eventually turn into a cranky older woman.
Dr. Pepper - Who needs med school? Everybody's a doctor!

* Britain too, apparently

Happy Anniversary to Us!

2011-01-20T00:01:00.001-06:00

We're six! That's "six," not "sex." We've never been described as "sex*," though people are welcome to do so, if it will bump up our hit count by a few thousand percent.

Since we're six now, we should be in grade school, which explains much of the content on this blog.

* The closest we've come is when people refer to us as "those ****heads." We're not sure what the "****" is, since they always use asterisks instead of the actual word.

Now That's a Miss America Talent!

2011-01-17T00:28:00.002-06:00

The Miss America Pageant was last night and the Fandos tuned in with interest, mainly because one of the contestants was the daughter of our insurance agent. She did a splendid job but just missed out becoming Miss America by a fraction (1st runner-up). Congratulations to her and the other contestants, and of course, Miss Nebraska, who was the winner. It was also very cool seeing her parents in the audience, who are lovely people.

Anyway, watching the talent part of the contest*, I realized that there just aren't enough unique talents in the pageant these days. These young ladies need some talent segments that will help distinguish themselves from the other statuesque beauties with perfect hair, figures, and teeth. They need something that will make the judges sit up and say to themselves, "Did I just see what I thought I saw?" And the answer will be, "Yes, yes you did, but don't worry, the shock will subside in a few months."

This is just the kind of blog to provide that kind of advice. So, hear are a few suggestions for the talent part of the competition. I expect you'll see more than one of these from a future Miss America!**

Parody runway walking
Crown juggling
Speed talking (as opposed to the ridiculous question and answer section of the pageant - Did we really need the $100,000 Pyramid reject "time is running out" music in the back?)
Sew together 3 evening gowns in under 60 seconds
Impersonations of Donald Trump, Christopher Walken, Barack Obama, and Mickey Rooney
Extreme contortionist
Funky jazzercise
Rip a phone book in two with bare hands
Unicycle through flaming hoop of death
Tightrope walking over a pit of angry hermit crabs
Speed zipper repair
Skateboarding Feng Shui consultant
Shoot a cigarette from the mouth of a chimpanzee with a spear gun
ABC's Wipeout color commentator
Naturalist trampolining
Nunchuku demonstration
Herd 100 cats into a pen in under 3 minutes
Dive 20 feet into a mug of frosty root beer***
Build a replica of the Eiffel Tower from Scotch Tape and Twizzlers
Write a raunchy limerick in under 30 seconds
Combination gymnastics/lingerie modeling
Hibachi chef - especially the part where they flip the shrimp tails into their hat
Eat an entire wedge of Limburger cheese in one bite ...without gagging
Alligator wrestling
Tie a knot in a cherry stem using only your tongue
Omelet flipping (harder than it looks)
Speed leg-waxing
Jello swimming

*Like any good husband, I pretended not to watch the swimwear part of the program.
** For any ladies using these suggestions, please remember to wear a costume that has the words "Unfortunate Ideas" across it in bright red letters, preferably across the chest area.
*** I can't think of any better use for root beer. I mean, who wants to actually drink the stuff? It's made of roots, people!

I had no idea elephants were so integral to marketing!

2011-01-10T00:42:00.002-06:00

BNET (The CBS Interactive Business Network) provides us with the 25 weirdest job interview questions of 2010. My first response was, "Hey, I remember that question!" My second was to realize that I haven't interviewed for a job since 2008 and that was just the codeine talking.*

However, when you look closely at the questions they're exactly the sensible and revealing kinds of interrogatives that you'd find on a prison psych exam. While I've never been in the joint or committed a felony, I'm pretty sure I can ace these. See what you think:

1. If you were shrunk to the size of a pencil and put in a blender, how would you get out?
Through the top, silly.

2. How many ridges are there around a quarter?
The exact same as on a Ruffles potato chip, as required by the Declaration of Independence! (hums America the Beautiful)

3. What is the philosophy of martial arts?
A kick in the groin is as good as a punch in the face. - Lao Tzu

4. Explain to me what has happened in this country during the last 10 years
Many, many, many, many things.

5. Rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 10 how weird you are
One below you. Ha!!!

6. How many basketballs can you fit in this room?
Inflated or deflated?

7. Out of 25 horses, pick the fastest 3 horses. In each race, only 5 horses can run at the same time. What is the minimum number of races required?
I can only determine this if I am the jockey for each horse.

8. If you could be any superhero, who would it be?
Flaming Carrot, who else? Ut!

9. You have a birthday cake and have exactly three slices to cut it into eight equal pieces. How do you do it?
Use the blender from question 1 and make eight equal piles of cake.

10. Given the numbers 1 to 1000, what is the minimum number of guesses needed to find a specific number if you are given the hint "higher" or "lower" for each guess you make?
One, if I'm right the first time. Up to 1,000 otherwise.

11. If you had 5,623 participants in a tournament, how many games would need to be played to determine the winner?
One game, winner take all! (And 1,000 decks of Go Fish cards)

12. An apple costs 20 cents, an orange costs 40 cents, and a grapefruit costs 60 cents. How much is a pear?
This question makes no sense, because it's just apples and oranges.

13. There are three boxes. One contains only apples, one contains only oranges, and one contains both apples and oranges. The boxes have been incorrectly labeled such that no label identifies the actual contents of its box. Opening just one box, and without looking in the box, you take out one piece of fruit. By looking at the fruit, how can you immediately label all of the boxes correctly?
Didn't you hear me in question 12?

14. How many traffic lights are in Manhattan?
Zero. This is based on the idea that if a tree falls in the forest and there is no one to hear it, it doesn't make a sound. If a traffic light is in Manhattan and no one pays any attention to it, it does not exist.

15. You are in a dark room with no light. You have 19 grey socks and 25 black socks. What are the chances you will get a matching pair?
I have never accomplished this feat.

16. What do wood and alcohol have in common?
They can both knock you on your ass.

17. How do you weigh an elephant without using a weigh machine?
Use a scale. What the heck is a "weigh machine," anyway?

18. You have 8 pennies. Seven weigh the same, but one weighs less. You also have a judges scale. Find the penny that weighs less in three steps.
I can do this in one step. I would ask the judge.

19. Why do you think only a small portion of the population makes over $150,000?
No idea, but if that's what you're offering, I accept the job!

20. You are in charge of 20 people. Organize them to figure out how many bicycles were sold in your area last year.
I live in Antarctica, so I already know the answer is two. I would therefore assign all twenty people to "penguin duty." What's penguin duty? (Laughs) Oh, you don't want to know, trust me!

21. How many bottles of beer are [consumed] in the city [in a] week?
Which city? London? 3 billion. Riyadh? three.

22. What's the square root of 2000?
Because the answer is not a whole number, I can only answer this using interpretive dance.

23. A train leaves San Antonio for Houston at 60 mph. Another train leaves Houson for San Antonio at 80 mph. Houston and San Antonio are 300 miles apart. If a bird leaves San Antonio at 100 mph, and turns around and flies back once it reaches the Houston train, and continues to fly between the two, how far will it have flown when they collide?
Just what kind of sicko enjoys causing trains to collide?

24. How are M&Ms made?
Chocolate on the inside, hard colored candy shell on the outside. Everyone knows this!

25. What would you do if you just inherited a pizzeria from your uncle?
Impossible! My uncle owns a deli!

*Lest you think I'm a druggie, I'm taking the codeine - vicodin, to be specific - for back spasms. Lucky me!

New Year's and Old Year's

2011-01-01T22:24:00.001-06:00

The new year is upon us and right about now people are vigorously checking off New Year's resolutions they've already failed to maintain ("blogging regularly" is still on my list, thank you very much, but "limiting my pizza intake" has a big "X" drawn on it in pizza sauce.)

Normally, I would regale you with my extensive list of improbable, Quixotic, miles-beyond-Kierkegaardian resolutions, but that would only have you clicking the back button in your browser to Gizmodo's special Jersey Shore secret Web-cam coverage. Instead, I've chosen this moment to appeal to your sentimental and nostalgic side, provided it hasn't been decimated by your New Year's Eve hangover.*

So, for the first time ever on this Web site (unless I've simply forgotten that we've done this before and also why we discontinued it), here are the first annual DoUI End of the Year that Was Awards:

[Stirring music, played by three full orchestras, a brass band, and one very energetic cow bell player]

[Quick shots of Jack Nicholson, Meryl Streep, Harrison Ford, and Oprah Winfrey]

ANNOUNCER (with the reverb turned way up): The Dictionary of Unfortunate Ideas proudly presents...

[Quick shots of George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, and the rest of the cast of the Ocean's Eleven remake and sequels]

ANNOUNCER: ...from the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in beautiful Hollywood, California...

[Quick shots of Barack and Michelle Obama, playing badminton, Dick Cheney throwing a horseshoe, and Sarah Palin wrestling a moose to the ground]

ANNOUNCER: ...The End of the Year that Was Awards!

[Quick shot of Jack Nicholson making out with Oprah Winfrey]

The You Won't Have Dick Nixon to Kick Around Anymore Award goes to Jay Leno. Leno announced he was retiring from the Tonight Show, then announced a new prime-time show that was almost exactly like the Tonight Show, then, after that show tanked in the ratings, got NBC to give him back the Tonight Show back at Conan O'Brien's expense. All Jay needs now is to hire G. Gordon Liddy to do "opposition research" and install a secret audiotape system in his Burbank studio. In a related story, NBC execs have given Late Night host Jimmy Fallon, the affectionate nickname "Spiro."
The Milli Vanilli Excellence in Talent Award goes to the cast of Jersey Shore. The cast are among the most famous people in America despite having yet to identify a single noteworthy talent among the lot of them, Snooki's freakish ability to withstand tanning radiation notwithstanding. Amazing side note: "The Situation" reportedly earns $50,000 for public appearances, which translates to approximately $8,333 per pec, or $1,000 per SAT score point.
The William Hung Popular Cacophony Award goes to the vuvuzela, the incredibly annoying "traditional" instrument of South Africa, played incessantly during the FIFA 2010 World Cup. That buzzing in your head today isn't from all the alcohol you drank last night. It's the remnants of vuvuzela noise from the Cup still buzzing around in your head like a bumblebee the size of the Incredible Hulk. All that's left to complete this aural nightmare is for this year's NFL Super Bowl champs to do a vuvuzela-backed remake of the Chicago Bears 1985 novelty hit "Super Bowl Shuffle."
The Paris Hilton, Your Fifteen Minutes of Fame were Up 4 Hours Ago Award goes to Kate Gosselin.** Heaven knows this woman has a lot of responsibilities. She has eight kids; her husband's decided to make up for his lost teenage years, and she dances only moderately better than Elaine on Seinfeld***. That said, enough already! We get it. Write the books, collect the royalties, sue the crap out of Jon, whatever it takes, just give us a break for awhile from the Emo, please! What's next, the album with the cover of Mr. Tambourine Man?
The O.J. Simpson Most Well-Known Celebrity to Very Publicly Blow a Gasket Award goes to Randy Quaid. The well known comic actor is currently residing with his wife in Canada, ostensibly on the lam from burglary charges in the U.S. However, Quaid describes the situation a little bit differently, telling the press that he and his spouse are seeking refugee status in Canada to escape the "Hollywood star whackers" who also are apparently responsible for the recent deaths of Heath Ledger and David Carradine. There has been no word on who is responsible for the death of Randy Quaid's acting career, however.

*And by hangover, we mean watching two hours of the New Year's with Carson Daly show.
**Paris Hilton is not actually eligible for this award, but would have won it the past five years running, were it available.
***Admittedly, this is moderately better than the author of this piece.

Happy Merry Christmas!

2010-12-25T00:00:00.008-06:00

A very happy one to all of you from all of us at the Dictionary of Unfortunate Ideas!

Holiday Advice

2010-12-24T22:27:00.004-06:00

Well, it's that holiday season! Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Festivus (for the completely cynical Seinfeld fan) have arrived. Of course, everyone wants to celebrate, have fun, and most of all ...not look like an idiot. After all, nothing hurts worse than hearing taunts like "Bennie doesn't know the difference between a kinara and a menorrah!" or "Tonya's so stupid she thinks Santa Claus is the patron saint of chimneys!" or "Earl's such a nimrod he only asked for underwear for Christmas!"*

So here's some advice on things to avoid during the season of celebration.

Avoid all jokes that begin with the words, "How do we know Santa's a pimp," and end with the phrase "Ho, ho, ho!"
Stockings hung above the fireplace should not be made of lace and do not require a garter.
The menorrah is a symbol of the light God provided Israel, not a cigarette lighter.
You should dress appropriately for all of the above holidays. A loincloth with a mistletoe sprig for a hat is completely inappropriate attire, especially at Midnight Mass.
Kwanzaa was not invented by The Reverend Jesse Jackson, President Barack Obama, or Kunta Kinte.
The gifts of the Magi were gold, frankencense, and myrrh, not gift cards to Romano's Macaroni Grill.**
Santa does not wear red because he's a "commie."
In the U.S. people say, "Merry Christmas!" In the U.K., "Happy Christmas!" In Mexico, "Feliz Navidad!" In France, "Joyeux Noël!" Nowhere in the world do people greet each other for Christmas with the words, "Up your chimney with a candy cane!" Not even in the Bronx.
None of Santa's reindeer are named Barbie.***

* A completely different Earl, I assure you.
**However, the authors of this blog will happily accept any donations of the latter; unless of course you want to send us gold instead.
*** Also, Rudolph's nose does not glow because he's an alcoholic, so stop telling your kids that.

Eyes in the Back of His Head, that One

2010-12-13T11:56:00.001-06:00

A New York University professor had a camera implanted in the back of his head, proving once and for all that tenure and insanity are not mutually exclusive.

Maybe he wanted to see just how many students in his lecture classes were flying him the bird when he was writing on the board. Perhaps we'll learn later in a follow-up article that 19 year old cheerleader and part-time lingerie model Missy is very disturbed as to why her professor always has his back to her and frequently includes the line "Work it, baby!" in his lectures.

Maybe he's about to embark on an attempt at the world's record for backwards walking/teaching/roller-blading and is taking some extra precautions. Maybe the rear camera in his Buick SUV keeps going out and he decided he needed a back-up. Or maybe he just wanted to know who was checking out his backside so he could give them a very special grade.

It's hard to figure out why a supposedly sensible, highly educated professional would go for such a radical upgrade to his self-image. I'm assuming he considers it an upgrade. Most people don't usually do things like that to themselves unless they think it's a positive. When's the last time you heard someone say, "Damn it, I'm 65 and I just don't have enough wrinkles on my face!" Or "I think a ring in my lip looks hideous, but I got tired of people paying me compliments on my 'perfect mouth.'"

After reading the article a bit more closely (to the end of the first paragraph), I discovered that the loony lecturer was added the posteriorly-positioned cranial camera for the sake of an art exhibit. I for one can't wait to see the Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art's exhibition of "The Back of a Nut of a Backwards Nut." As cinematic inspiration, I'm sure it will rank right up there with works like Andy Warhol's "5000 Ways to Make You Comatose," Frank Zappa's "I Celebrate Myself in Extreme Close Up," and Gigli.*

I'm not exactly sure what the ultimate goal of the artwork will be, but I suspect it will be like the Dada fur-covered toilet. It will be utterly useless, but everyone will want one.
* I'm told these first two films have other titles, but I had to go with what I remembered. I'm not about to Google or IMDB the words "Warhol" or "Zappa."

Is There Anybody Out There?

2010-12-02T00:34:00.000-06:00

Tommorrow the folks at NASA will be holding a press conference to discuss "an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life." This notice has set off a flurry of spacey speculation about the potentially astronomical consequences of the announcement. People are predicting everything from a new scientific discovery that will aid in the search for life on other worlds to the impending return of an extraterrestial Elvis to conquer the world and turn it into one giant combination of Graceland and Las Vegas.

Admittedly, that last one is a theory of mine.

Since NASA has not been forthcoming with details about ther impending conference, speculation is all we have until tomorrow. So, here are my ideas for what just might happen when the cameras start rolling.

DNA turns out to be directions to their place.
The bedbug scourge is extraterrestial in origin.
Aliens are sending us several thousand variations of "Uranus jokes."
NASA reveals they've been tricked by NBC Public Relations into believing that "The Event" is a reality series.
We're getting extraterrestial demands to reinstate Pluto as a planet ...or else.
Alien life discovered on a meteorite accidentally mistaken for guacamole in NASA lab. NASA just wanted to apologize and to appeal to aliens for the receipe.
NASA finally provides a rational explanation for the playtpus.
Aliens are sending us back edited versions of I Love Lucy in which the Mertzes are "from out of town."
Andy Kaufman's back with an invasion fleet. (Somebody alert Berke Breathed.)
Extraterrestial life consists of the exact same chemicals as Elizabeth Taylor "Diamonds" perfume.*
Aliens have contacted Earth, demanding a "throwdown" with chef Bobby Flay.
Alien lifeforms are sending audition tapes for "Survivor." NASA says that the tapes aren't really very good at all.
NASA has discovered that supposedly advanced societies never got past their "disco" eras.
Aliens want to take on Michael Jordan in a game of hoops, now that he's middle aged.
Extraterrestials ask us to stop sending junk into space. They're sending back Voyager in a recycle bin.
Aliens warn that Earth will be destroyed unless we stop beaming episodes of "Cake Boss" into space.
NASA has discovered that random space static is actually the galaxy's most popular form of grunge music.
Alien transmissions contain numerous references to the "leader of the Earth: Mr. Conan O'Brien."
The press conference is mysteriously interrupted by a large mass of glowing swamp gas.

*This explains much about the ex-Mrs. Burton's spacey personality.

And yet no farther than a won-ton's bird*

2010-11-30T01:00:00.040-06:00

The winter wind was angrily gusting outside. Inside though, a fire was glowing in the fireplace and the family was gathered around the dinner table, awaiting a warm and comforting meal. The mother glided in to the dining room from the kitchen, confident in her culinary abilities, beaming with love for her family. The father sat at the head of the table, a smile of pride on his face. The adolescent son and little daughter leaned forward in their seats, hungry anticipation on their innocent faces.

The mother set the platter down on the neatly set table and carefully lifted the cover off.

The father nervously turned his eyes away. The children sank back in their chairs, faces suddenly exhausted.

Photo: TheKohser

The little girl turned to her mother and with exasperation exclaimed, "You're giving us the bird again!"

**********
Yes, Thanksgiving week has come and gone and you've still got enough turkey in your fridge to feed the Kardashian family. It never fails. No matter how carefully you plan, no matter how much everyone enjoys that beautiful roast (smoked, or deep-fried) bird, when all is said and done and the relatives and other assorted guests have said their farewells, that enormous bird is still sitting there on the table, covered in meat.

What to do, what to do?

We'll that's why they pay us the big bucks, or will, when some of of sensitive intelligence, good humor, and massive financial resources** discovers this blog. The easiest way to get rid of that unwanted extra turkey is to use a little thing called imagination. However, if you're like us and haven't got much of that, as is our custom here, we have some other ideas:

Turkey Skin Soup. Use every part of your turkey! Added bonus: When this soup develops a skin, it's real cooked skin!
Dog treats for very undiscriminating dogs (this covers 99% of the species)
Pop a slice in the toaster! What kid doesn't love "Turkey Pop Tarts?" (wink, wink)
Inexpensive coasters
Treats for Santa. He'll eat anything! Break out those Christmas cookie cutters and fool the big guy!
Fake mustache Use the stringier parts of the turkey for this one, folks.
Secret hiding place for valuables. The last place any burgular will look is up your turkey.
Creative paint brushes
New breakfast cereal: "Frosted Sugar Coated Turkey Flakes! Your kids will gobble them up!"
Turkey grease Slip-n-Slide for indoor winter fun
Props for an upcoming episode of Bones. In addition to Fox television producers, this can also apply to next year's Halloween costumes, for those of you with kids!
Novelty Prince Charles ears
Projectiles for defense against the robots, when they come for your old people on Cyber Monday.***
Stuffing for some other kind of meat. "Wow, this pork chop is chock-full of roast turkey!"
Umami potpourri

* Romeo And Juliet Act 2, scene 2. Seriously.
** Bet you thought we were talking about you until that last one, didn't you?
*** That's what Cyber Monday refers to, right? Fortunately, our family has Old Glory Insurance!

Let's say that something happened to Leslie Nielsen...

2010-11-30T00:00:00.000-06:00

... OK. "Something happened to Leslie Nielsen."

Sadly, it's true. The beloved Canadian actor, remembered especially for his appearances in Airplane! and Police Squad, has passed on. When such a delightfully silly person leaves the world, it can't help but be a little less funny place to live in. R.I.P.

Oh, The Mysteries of Art!

2010-11-17T22:59:00.000-06:00

Three patrons are standing with an artist at his new show. They are looking at a picture of the artist's newest work, a white canvas with a single black lin painted down the middle of it.

First Patron: I'm intrigued by the message of your latest piece. I'm guessing it's a representation of all the artificial dichotomies between members of the human race.

Artist: Nope.

Second Patron: I suspected as much. It's clearly portrait of solitude in the psychological wilderness of reality.

Artist: Nope.

Third Patron: Hmmm. It strikes me as an image of desolation and man's resilience in the face of the total catastrophe of civilization.

Artist: Nope.

A schoolgirl walks by. She looks at the painting for five seconds, then tugs the artist on the shirt.

Schoolgirl: Is that a symbolic representation of the way in which pretentious abstract art confounds self-important psuedo intellectuals who feign understanding when faced with ambiguity?

Artist: That's the one.

Patrons: (simultaneously) Knew it all the time.

Conan the TBSerian

2010-11-17T22:21:00.000-06:00

Well I've finally recovered from the overdose of political advertising I received. The antidote was severe: two straight weeks of Hallmark television, punctuated with the occasional QVC, when my therapist was doing a little early Christmas shopping.

Actually, I was able to squeeze in a bit more television than that, and have caught some of Conan's new episodes. As always, there were plenty of surprises.

Conan has a beard. It's somewhere between a James Lipton and a ginger Abraham Lincoln.
No sign of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, yet. However, the Masturbating Bear has made at least two appearances. So, the comedy of jerkiness continues.
La Bamba has returned to the band after his unsuccessful independent bid to become Senator from Alaska. Apparently, thousands of people spelled his name "M-u-r-k-o-w-s-k-i."
Tom Hanks was doused with water by a breaching whale. Yes, I know that sounds like a pregnant joke, but that's what happened.
Conan has his own blimp. As a promotion for the show they're torn between a remake of Black Sunday and the final minutes of View to a Kill.
Conan's opening night ratings demolished the competition. Dave responded with a call Conan to congratulate him. Jay parked one of his cars in Conan's space.
There have been repeated references to "The Tokyo Sandblaster." Apparently, it's not a mixed drink, it's a sexual position. Welcome to TBS!
Conan's show is being filmed at the Warner Brothers lot. The result is that his rivarly with Jay Leno has been supplanted by a bitter contest of wills with Daffy Duck.
The show set has a 3-D moon in the background that can be moved around the set. This was installed after Andy Richter declared he would do no more bits that involved him being pantsed.
Harrison Ford said the word s***, unbleeped.* Bet you've never seen Harrison do that on basic cable, unless you're Callista Flockhart and he was leaning on the flat screen while describing an episode of Sex in the City.

* This actually happened. I think Harrison was talking in his sleep.

You Never Know What'll Happen in Politics!

2010-11-02T00:34:00.001-05:00

The U.S. mid-term elections are tomorrow night, and given that Congressional and Senate races are as unpredictable as Randy Quaid is these days, who knows what will happen?

OK, I was lying. Everyone seems to the think the GOP are poised for ginormous pickups. Even Keith Olbermann is probably secretly stockpiling Intrade futures on Sharon Angle.* I do think there will be a few massive surprises though.

The 2010 Mid-Term Elections' Biggest Surprises (as told by Earl Fando)

The Alaska Senate seat is shockingly won by the write-in candidate, former Detroit Tigers 3rd baseman Phil Mankowski.
98 people announce they are running for President in 2012. Half of them are people who have just been elected to Congress.
The Washington Senate race ends in a tie. The race is decided by a 100 year old Washington law decreeing mud wrestling as the solution for political draws. No one knows who the winner is until they are hosed off the next day.
Fox News calls the Senate for the GOP by 4:30 p.m. EDT.
MSNBC calls the House when Talk show host Ed Schultz announces "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take it any more!"
Charlie Sheen declares he will run in the 2012 elections. He is quoted as saying that he "finally feels scandalous enough to run for office." He states he has not chosen a race but will decide after a long conversation with his favorite brand of tequila. The most common questions reporters ask Mr. Sheen is, "Would you kindly put your clothes back on?"
Joe Biden calls Nancy Pelosi repeatedly to congratulate her on her new job as Speaker of the House.
Newt Gingrich shows up at Senate majority leader Harry Reid's election party, laughing manaically into a megaphone.
Florida Governor Charlie Crist claims that the person who really asked Democrat Kendrick Meek to withdraw from the Florida Senate race was none other than world famous author Salman Rushdie, who, unsurprisingly, was unavailable for comment.
President Obama apologizes for his recent "enemies" comment and vows in future to only refer to Republicans as "my best friends, bosom buddies, and lifelong pals."
At 2 a.m., Karl Rove surprises everyone by playing the Dukes of Hazzard theme song with arm farts.
The Democratic National Committee announces that they are changing the Democrat mascot from the donkey to a picture of a deer in the headlights.
Sarah Palin reveals on Fox News that she and Tina Fey are really the same person**

*And swearing like the schoolmarm in Blazing Saddles as he does.
** She also reveals the subtle differences between saying "you betcha" and "you &%$@!" and to which audiences to apply each.

Halloween Costumes on a Budget!

2010-10-31T02:05:00.003-05:00

As everyone knows, the economy is still tough and many people are out of work. So, how are you going to dress up and celebrate Halloween when your budget is tighter than Shakira's outfits? Here are a few suggestions for quick and low cost alternatives to the commercial, expensive costumes found in those creepy Halloween Express stores.

Trampy French Maid - Black dress (shrunken in dryer), cheap dust apron, dirty feather duster, full tube of lipstick
Crazy Doctor - allergy face mask, novelty arrow-through-the-head
Vampire from Twilight - Plastic fangs, preppy shirt, large bottle of glitter
Avatar Na'vi - Leftover Blue Man Group costume and makeup from Halloween in 2003, kitchentowel loincloth
Snooki from Jersey Shore - XXL Hair extensions, half a fifth of Tequila.
Charlie Sheen - Whole fifth of bargain tequila, magnum of bargain champagne, case of beer, spin around in a circle for 90 minutes (listed here for demonstration purposes - not actually recommended)
Human Rice Krispies Treat - One box of Rice Krispies. One bottle of Elmer's Glue
Brett Favre - One pair of Crocs, One battered Minnesota Vikings helmet.
Paranormal Activity Character - Pajamas, disheveled hair, case of the jitters
Hogwarts Student - Stylishly worn jeans, knobby stick (wand), passable English accent
Republican Candidate - Old suit, solid red tie
Democratic Candidate - Old suit, solid blue tie
Green Party Candidate - Old suit, tye dyed tie
Dancing With the Stars Contestant - Last year's costume, MP3 player, excessive makeup
Werewolf - Torn t-shirt, three-day beard (three-week leg stubble for women), fleas
Zombie - Torn t-shirt, lack of sleep, raw liver

Return of the Original Best Thing Ever

2010-10-29T09:58:00.004-05:00

Nuffy Noe here. Glad to re-make your acquaintance, all you internet lurkers. I have been gone for many a moon, trying to make it in Hollywood. It's a tough business, I tell you, tough as a plate of over-fried hog jowls. I did everything I could think to do to be noticed. You see, I wrote a screenplay, and, I have to be honest, it's the best screenplay you've ever heard about in your short, miserable life. I consider it The Great American Screenplay. If Mark Twain were alive, I don't doubt for two microseconds that he would personally endorse this screenplay and love me for it.

The trick is, I can't get anyone to read it. I put it in Danny Devito's mailbox, but he just marked it Return to Sender and dumped it in the gutter. I snuck it through a crack in David Hasselhoff's car window, but he deliberately poured coffee on it, ripped it up into little soggy pieces, put it in a plastic bag, and tossed it into the sedimentation tank at the Orange County Sewage Treatment Plant. It took a long session with a hair dryer and a whole lot of scotch tape to put the thing back together (yes, yes, I only have one copy. Kinko's is expensive when you work at the Fatburger). My final plan was to throw the script right into the big, pasty face of Bob Saget, and I hit him good, too. Blood and snot spewed in all directions like the Fountain of Styx. Unfortunately, it was only a Bob Saget impersonator working for tips on Hollywood Boulevard, and after I hit him, he chased me for five blocks, screaming, cursing and making these strange mewling noises. Fortunately, he had a gimp leg and couldn't catch me.

So where does that leave me? On the D-List, at least. Possibly the E-List. But I haven't given up. You, Dear Readers, are my next plan. I will post a delicious morsel of my screenplay right here on this blog in the hopes that one of you has "connections" to the people who can green light this Next Best Thing. Here is the Oscar Moment:

Dooter's Revelation -- Scene 23

EXT. FANCY NIGHTCLUB -- NIGHT

Dooter is straddling his bike, a cherry red Multistrada 1200, in the parking lot of Floppy's Night Sweat Club and Grill, smoking a Swisher Sweet cigarillo. He is complex, sweaty, turgid, with floppy hair dangling in vast curly stalks down in his face. Muncy, his fine example of a lady, stands nearby, one high heel shoe held in her hand.

MUNCY -- I wish you'd quit smokin' that murder stick and love me the way a real man is supposed to love a real woman.

DOOTER -- Cain't, Muncy. Gotta think 'bout killin' a man.

MUNCY -- You ain't gone kill my step-brother, is you? He never meant no harm, Dooter. Now, you know he needed that money. He's dyin' of rabies, and you never gave him no never mind.

DOOTER -- He burnt m'dog. I don't permit no man to burn m'dog and walk this earth. I'm gonna put him down the way Jonas Salk put down polio.

MUNCY -- How dare you talk about polio when you knowed it done ruint my mama.

Muncy throws the shoe at Dooter. It puts his eye out. He screams and collapses to the gravel.

DOOTER - Muncy! You took my good eye! I can't see the world no more. I'm falling.

MUNCY -- I've loved you since you first picked them scabs. I've loved you like the lightning loves the wet old earth.

DOOTER -- I ain't able to love, not after the surgery.

MUNCY steals his bike and leaves him forever. Dooter raises his hands to the sky as it starts to rain. The rain falls on his face and slicks his hair back against his skull like a burial cloth.

DOOTER -- Curse of the night! Oh, father, that you taught me the ways of hate! Oh, mother, that you never called me by name! I will never love again!

DOOTER dies.

End

I really don't know how a screenplay could be better than that. That one scene contains everything you'd want in a movie: pathos, drama, tension, dialogic reasoning, love, glory and human pain. Please make it a reality for me, People with Connections. I will never not be grateful! Never not.

Tooting My Own Horn

2010-10-26T21:24:00.000-05:00

To my amazement today I discovered that I have been quoted in a book. Not just any book, mind you. I was quoted in Did Somebody Step on a Duck: A Natural History of the Fart. Page 47, if you're thumbing through your copy.

I know. I nearly fainted, too. Heady stuff (and that wasn't a fart joke.)

I'm also listed in the resources, on page 175. I'm on the same page as William Golding!

My grateful thanks to author Jim Dawson, for including my comments.

Electronic Nose Hair Trimmer? I thought that was the turn signal!

2010-10-23T00:59:00.003-05:00

Photo by Xavigivax

Everyone loves to have a few nice features in their car. However, some people have clearly gone well past fifth gear on their journey to luxurydom.
For example, the 2011 BMW 750i has something called "The Gentleman Function." I know what you're thinking:

"It's a long journey, but I don't have to stop to go to the restroom. I've got the 'Gentleman Function!'" (cue rock-n-roll music, fade in toilet flush)

Actually though, it's just a device that allows you to adjust the front passenger seat from the drivers side. It only sounds like an in-vehicle port-a-potty for guys.

My favorite of the features listed was the $1.7 million 2011 Bugatti Veyron's "Top Speed Key." Turning this little key allows the Veyron to adjust so that it can reach its top speed of 253 mph.

Yes, 253 miles per hour. Don't believe it? Ask James May of BBC's Top Gear. He actually did it on a Volkswagen test track. I'm not even a fan of Top Gear or an auto gearhead and I was weeping into my tortilla chips and salsa verde at the end of the amazing clip. The Veyron is faster than Formula One cars. He could have blown past Japanese bullet trains like Superman after 50 cups of espresso.

(Incidentally, I believe this will spawn a new game, similar to the VW Punch Dub game. Only in this version, whenever someone sees a Bugatti Veyron, they will knock you through a wall with a sledgehammer.)

The way I see it though, even with all the exotic features out there, the auto companies are still coming up short. It takes real imagination to come up with the really, truly useful and/or bizarre* functions that will entice people into a really upscale model vehicle.

Fortunately, that's why we're here. So, take note auto manufacturers, and be sure to contact us about the royalties for these, once they revitalize the moribund luxury auto industry.

**********

The Caboose Massusse - No doubt you've all seen the seat covers that cab drivers use to comfort their back, and many of you have spent time in an electronic massage chair. Why can't we combine those ideas into one auto feature that everyone will need: An electronic keister massager!

If your butt is anything like mine (and it probably isn't, because hey, I work out), after a trip of several hundred miles it feels like someone has stapled warm slabs of pine to the back of your pelvic girdle. It makes travel a massive gluteal chore (and by "massive," I mean time, not the size of my posterior). Why can't we make that journey a refreshing, invigorating asset (no pun intended) instead?

There would be a variety of models, with various settings that would mold your overstressed buns into various states of relaxation, from "mildly taut" to "bags of warm jello."
Dashboard Secretary - You stick-in-the-mud, hung up, straight-laced, inflexible, cash-obsessed, workaholic (all right, I'll stop now) business types are always trying to get extra work done during your morning commutes. And who can blame you?!

Unfortunately, the preferred methods these days are either wierd looking (the earpiece phone - don't get me started) or dangerous (word processing on a laptop on the Autobahn, while steering with your feet). Wouldn't it be easier to have someone do that for you, while you take care of the important business of driving?

The Dashboard Secretary would be a built-in computer that could recognize your voice, take dictation, manage phone calls - including rerouting threatening phone calls from recession-obsessed creditors who are wondering how you could afford a car with this kind of functionality. It would also make and serve coffee, donuts, frappuccino, omelets, Raisin Bran, toast with Marmite, and other sundry breakfast items. Finally, on long trips, it would be programmed to talk to you in a soothing voice and explain why you really are a dynamic and attractive person, and not the simpering wimp your CEO claims you are during board meetings.
Avatar Windshield - No, this wouldn't be a cobalt blue windshield made out of "unobtanium," whatever the heck that crap is. Instead, it would be a windshield that digitally replaces you in the car with the celebrity of your choice.

Imagine the look on your neighbors faces when Angelina Jolie or Orlando Bloom pull up into your driveway. Befuddle the kiddies in school buses, as they stare in wonder at SpongeBob Squarepants driving the sedan behind them. Does your commute take you through dangerous neighborhoods? Opt for the Clint Eastwood "Dirty Harry" setting, complete with digital 44 Magnum, ostentatiously holstered inside an open jacket.
Theater Seating - Let's put on a show! Even the most proletarian of vehicles comes with a built-in video player and monitor. This little feature would take that up a notch or three by placing a fully functional stage just in front of the rear passenger seating. Depending on the size of your vehicle, you could host everything from an off-Broadway one-man act to Cats.

The stage would come with lights, curtains, wings, a small dressing room, and for special performances, an orchestra pit under the seats. A small bar would be available for between act drinks (drivers, please abstain).
The Bond Package - No, no, no, NOT Sean Connery's anatomy. This package would contain the various weapons, features, and devices featured on every Bond vehicle from Dr. No to Quantum of Solace (including the Jimmy Bond devices from the original Casino Royale)!

What better way to slice through morning traffic than to playfully lob a few heat seeking missles into the gridlock in front of you. And don't fret about any nasty legal repercussions. This package also comes with a licence to kill.**

*Yes, yes, bizarre is the preferred route on this blog. Hush now, we're getting to the meaty stuff.
** May only be valid in United Kingdom, or couldn't you tell that from the spelling?

Maybe We Should Have Named the School "America University?"

2010-10-14T00:15:00.000-05:00

Drake University recently implemented a new marketing plan to promote the academic experience a student would get at the midwestern school. I guess this story demonstrates the pitfalls of marketing a school whose name begins with the letter "D."

Drake's idea of "D+" as a marketing logo is right up there with the old Latin-American promotion of the Chevy Nova. You know, the car whose name in Spanish means "no go."

The marketers who foisted this plan on Drake have a great career ahead of them ... in satire. Who knows where these jesters will strike next?

The University of Notre Dame, where getting an education is as challenging and exciting as getting beaten up. They don't call us the Fightin' Irish for nothing.
Harvard University. When you pay this much for an education, you deserve to act like a snob.
Morehead State University. If you can find us, you're smart enough to get in!
The University of LasVegas. If you're going to gamble on your education, you've come to the right place!
The University of Hawaii. Get into a grass skirt today!
The University of Southern California. Come for an education. Leave with an agent.
Brigham Young University. Your college education should be beautiful and rewarding, just like your wives.
Alabam-Birmingham University. Just in case you couldn't remember which state Birmingham was in.
The University of Texas, where getting horny is encouraged!
Slippery Rock University. Find your balance with us.

New for Oktoberfest! Pigs So Hot They'll Melt Your Face Off!

2010-10-04T00:56:00.001-05:00

Radioactive wild boars are running loose in Germany! Surprisingly, this is not a story being reported by The Weekly World News but instead was brought to my attention by the publicly funded newshounds at National Public Radio (or NPR*).

The story is about a month old now, but I can think of no better way to kick off Oktoberfest than by pointing out the amazing new dangers of over-imbibing. It used to be that one or two steins too many would just result in the usual risks of drunkenness: dangerous driving, eating too many schnitzels to try to absorb the alcohol, and realizing the next day that the gorgeous barmaid named Helga that you spent the evening with was in actuality a burly custodian named Edgar. ("But, oh how he could dance!" is the only pathetic consolation that your hungover brain can latch on to by this point.**)

Well, that's all samll potato pancakes now. There are radioactive wild boars roaming the countryside. Too many lagers these days and you might accidentally stroll into the Black Forest and find yourself gored by bristling pig the size of a Volkswagen Bug.*** I don't actually know if the radiation is causing these wild pigs to grow in size, but it worked on Godzilla, so mind your sauerbraten! If a pig the size of the Eiffel Tower stomps it's way through Berlin, I don't want to say I told you so.

The only danger greater than giant, mutated, radioactive wild boars with chainsaws for tusks, hooves with red-hot spikes on the bottom, and wearing enormous William Shatner masks, is the risk you might accidentally sign yourself up as the main course at a cannibal restaurant.

That's right, Berlin's got a new eatery in the works and the main course could be you. (Warning: the linked story may give you a severe case of indigestion.) At least we can safely assume that most of the dishes are self-marinated.

The name of this new churrascaria is Flime, which is German for "Are you still using that limb?" The idea is that potential dineres (or is it dinees?) volunteer body parts and then the customers participate in the ""Wari-culture" of the restaurant, which involves cooking and eating the parts.

My guess is that the only serious interest will come from people who have severely damaged their brains with massive quantites of special label beer during Germany's most famous festival.

If it were me, I think I'd rather face off with the mutant razorback.

*Pronounced "NNNNPPPPPrrrtthhhggghh"
** No, I am not writing from experience, thank you very much.
*** It's at this point in the conversation that the Littlest Fando would strike me on the arm and shout "Radioactive one!"

An Unfortunate Earful!

2010-09-27T00:29:00.005-05:00

We've been doing a little audio experimenting around here lately. For your entertainment, here's a sample: The Most Interesting Outtakes in the World - The Audio Version.

Note: There's a slight problem with the second to last cut in the audio. It's not designed exactly that way. I'll see if I can get it fixed this evening.

PS: Well, You Tube seems to not like MP3 audio in WMV format. However, the current version is slightly better.

I've been dizzy lately...

2010-09-22T21:36:00.000-05:00

...dealing with an episode of Meniere's Disease. I have a minor form of this, which means it only hits every two years or so and I can actually stand when the vertigo hits. By "stand," I mean wobble about the house holding on to walls and door frames. Since some people get this weekly or monthly, I'm very thankful that I have the minor version.

Nonetheless, it makes typing on a keyboard or even looking at the monitor a bit uncomfortable. By uncomfortable, I mean everything spins a bit and there's a fair amount of nausea, unless I hold my head in just the right spots. Fortunately, the spots this time are sitting up and looking ahead, so I can watch television and do a little computing (if I don't look down at the keyboard too much).

When my head's in the wrong position, it's as though everything starts to spin clockwise, slowly at first, then repeating faster, as though it were in an elliptical loop from an avant garde minimalist 60's movie. So, I feel like I've been sleeping all week in a particularly wretched Andy Warhol film.

I;ve heard someone say that Meniere's is a lot like being violently drunk. This is why I don't ever drink more than one beer in a sitting. I feel like someone hit me with a beer bottle.

I have no idea what Nuffy and Stew's excuses are, but apparently their episodes have lasted months. Heal my friends.

Actually, I'm schedule to have lunch with Nuffy tomorrow, so I'll ask.

No Ma'am, I Never Meant to Rock You at All

2010-09-16T07:00:00.030-05:00

The trending topic that had everyone buzzing on Twitter last night was #rockretractions. (In fact, as of this writing, it's still surging along on Twitter, if you want to play.) Lots of people were posting them, including a fair number of well-known Tweeters*: "Weird Al" Yankovic, James Lileks, Adam Baldwin, Harry Shearer, the guy from IMAO (who managed the Twitter equivalent of a Rickroll with one of his - impressive**), etc.

I won't bother to explain the joke, as it will be pretty obvious from my own prolific contributions to the topic. Just in case you're interested, here they are (with a few slight edits to offer extra blogging value!) It's kind of like a crazy pop culture quiz:

**********

Yeah, I know I said "any way you want it" but it only comes with pickles, mustard, ketchup and these crappy fries.
Perhaps "love" is a bit strong, but I am somewhat fond of LA.
Forget about me already! Sheesh!
Instead of taking me to Funkytown, how about I take you to Walgreens for some air freshener, and roll-on.
You can turn around. Der Comissar's at EuroDisney.
On second thought, Amadeus, just mind your own damn business.
OK, I confess. I was born on the Canadian side of Niagra Falls.
Love cuts like a skill saw.
His name was Jack but hers was Ethel.
Don't put your hand inside the puppet head! I put a rat trap in there.
I thought I felt it comin' in the air tonight, but it turned out to be gophers, underfoot. Boy, do I feel stupid!
I never kissed the sky. It was actually a fogbank.
Turns out I was crazy. That's why I thought I was impaired!
I never so much "ruled the world" as bullied my pet hamsters and the guy who sleeps on the stoop outside.
If I lay here, if I just lay here ...would you get up and fetch me a beer?
I checked with corporate and I have to apologize. You really are the boss of me.
It wasn't a sex farm at all. It was a sex ranch.
Turns out, I was working on a Guatelmalan radio.
It turns out, Joe DiMaggio was sellin' coffee on the television the whole time!
You're on your own, Major Tom.
It was really my Pinochle face.
I pretty much get fooled every election.
You can put me in coach, but I've got a massive hangover.
Major Tom actually never left earth. He got lost in the television studio. #rockconspiracies
Were the end of the world to happen, I would probably be in a world of hurt.
Those only reason I was singing "Fire!" is because Peter Buck gave me a hot foot during that take.
Leave those old records on the shelf. I've got them on my iPod, now.
Like a bridge over troubled water, eventually, I will buckle and collapse into a wet, messy pile of junk.
As it turns out, folks don't lend a hand at all in a hell hole.
They were really dull, miserable people.
Yes, yes, yes let's start! This is the best part!
Baby, love's got everything to do with it!
Time is flowing like Heinz ketchup.
The levy was filled deep and loaded with bass. I fished for hours.
Hell yes, we started the fire!
The only reason there was smoke on the water is because we put the fire out.
Do not take me on. You'd whip me in a fair fight and then I really would be gone. Doo doo doo doo dooooooo.
Ricky didn't blow her mind. It was the Colt 45.
Ricky didn't blow her mind, it was the malt liquor. #twitterretractions
I have 57 photographs of you and I spend all day wishing.
The answer was blowing in my bong.
Some people are roller skating USA.
I like eagles, but I really flew like a Gypsy Moth.
It was more like a hop, rather than a jump.
She was just an above-average freak.
On second thought, stay over there Eileen. You smell a bit.
Our house was really in the garden like other houses.
We would like to rock you, but we have weak arms.
I would never, ever shock a real monkey.
Actually, that smells like teen flopsweat.
Actually, if you feel it, it probably is there ...at least if it's a tomahawk.
I can live with or without you. I mean, otherwise, I'd be dead already.
They really only call me Mr. Love, Esq.
Not only will I be your beast of burden, I will paint your house.
I exaggerated. Dude looks like one of those Redskins fans with the dresses and the pig noses.
We can't dance at all, much less when we want to. It would be dangerous.
Actually, we only burned down the "outhouse."
As it turns out, she wasn't actually an evil woman. She was oppositional-defiant.
I know we said "Don't look back," but then we started to think, "What if some creepy guy's behind us?"

Yes, yes I love this topic. How did you guess?

*Normally, I refer to we denizens of Twitter as "Twits" but really, only a few of us merit that nomenclature.
** To get the full effect, you have to imagine it being said in the Darth Vader voice.

That Is One Smokin' Golf Swing

2010-09-13T00:43:00.000-05:00

A golfer in California has a game so hot, it started a wildfire.

The reality of what happened to the poor, unnamed duffer is that he hit a rock during a swing and the resultant sparks ingnited a blaze that, according to the AP source in the article, covered 25 acres.

As Jay Busbee of Yahoo!'s Devil Ball Golf blog points out, "This is going to inspire a raft of bad Sportscenter-esque 'When we say he set the course on fire, he really set the course on fire!' jokes." Well, of course it is! This is like your birthday and Christmas present rolled into one. Frankly, this sort of thing deserves some really bad jokes. I didn't even bother looking at the comments section for the article, in case someoine beat me to one of these.

Ball before rock, dude. Ball before rock.
As it turns out, starting a fire is a two-stroke penalty.
Playing the course was on his bucket list. Apparently, it took 1000 buckets to pour out the fire.
If only the guy was near a sand trap. With his swing he could have buried that fire in under 3 strokes.
On the bright side, the golfer was a Boy Scout. He got his fire-starting merit badge out of the deal.
It wouldn't have been so bad if he hadn't double-bogied the hole.
Can Tiger's year get any worse?
Nice shot Johnny Blaze! Next time ride your freakin' flaming golf cart to the tennis courts, willya?
The sad part is, 20 minutes after they put out the fire the course sprinklers came on.
You know you've had a bad round when the firefighters have to play through.
Make you kinda long for the good old days of wooden clubs.
Good thing this guy's ball didn't land next to some uranium.

September 11th

2010-09-13T00:08:00.000-05:00

This post is a day late but it hardly seems like 9 years ago when the Towers came down and the Pentagon was in flames. To all those who lost loved ones on the flights and in the buildings and on the streets, God keep and comfort you. We won't forget them or you.

I Think It's Thinning Out Ahead... We Could Be Out of Here in a Day or Two!

2010-09-04T23:57:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago there was a traffic jam just outside of Beijing. Normally, traffic jams in big cities aren't big news, but in the capital city of the world's most populous country they do things really big. This traffic jam lasted for nine days.

Nine days! Nine freakin' days. If this traffic jam happened during the Olympics two years ago, people driving to the early track and field events would have found parking just after the closing ceremonies.

So, if you're running nine days behind for work, how does that work? You figure the weekend would bust up the traffic jam a bit, but no.* You can't even drive in the following Monday and pretend you hit a time warp:

"I'm here, right on time for Monday morning!"

"It's Wednesday, a week later."

"Well, there was this... Wednesday?! (long pause) I got nothing."

"It's OK. We're a communist nation, so you still have a job."

"Whew."

"But we had to relocate you. Here are your tickets to our Tibetan branch."

"Tibet? Tibet?!? That's where I'm commuting from!"

I think of all those people out on the highway for nine days. You can only ration out your McDonald's Big Breakfast out for so long. After three or four days, I suspect it was like Lord of the Flies out there. I envision businessmen running around in Brooks Bros. suits with the sleeves torn off and their Louis Vuitton ties wrapped around their heads like bandannas. Between the battles for convenience stores and staking out turf at rest stop restrooms ("Before you can relieve yourself, you must pay tribute!") it would get pretty hairy.

I don't know if Chinese radio stations have traffic helicopters , but if they did, just imagine the utter futility:

"There's a massive bottleneck on the G020 outside of Langfang. You may want to take the alternate route to the G104. If you're already on the G020, you may want to stop at the nearest convenience store and stock up on a few hundred pounds of beef jerky and shotgun ammunition."

It's a testimony to the relative experience of cities like L.A., New York, Bombay, London, and Dallas that they've never experience traffic jams quite this extensive. Oh sure, it's felt that long...

*Say this in a John Belushi SNL circa 1978 voice for maximum effect.

Salt, Is There Anything It Can't Do? Redux

2010-09-01T23:39:00.001-05:00

Long time readers of this blog know that yours truly is a big fan of salt. I love the stuff the way koalas love eucalyptus leaves. I love it the way Joey Chestnut loves Nathan's hot dogs.* I love it the way Charlie Sheen loves grain alcohol. Salt is good food.

So, when someone releases an article extolling the many uses of salt, I'm not surprised at the versatility of the wonderful granules of goodness. Indeed, the Salt Institute's report on uses for salt is somewhat similar to the Web article I linked to in my 2007 post.

There are 14,000 uses for salt! That's just slightly more than the receipes I have for the stuff. (If the secret ingredient for Iron Chef were salt, I might just stand a chance. My presentations would be a little grainy, though.)

What I really love though is the fact there's such a place as the Salt Institute at all. This sounds like a dream job for me, so long as I was in a taste-tester position. I think it would be cool if the institute had leadership positions

The part of their Web site that I find most inspiring is the "Miracle uses" section. I know salt is mentioned in the Bible (several places but Matthew 5:13 is the one that comes to mind. I shudder to think of unsalty salt -That's dirt, people.**) However, I did not know salt could extinguish grease fires, clean fish tanks, drip-proof candles, kill poison ivy, keep windows frost free, and track and capture Osama Bin Laden.

OK, I made that last one up, but given a chance, I bet salt could swing it.

**********
Osama Bin Laden is sitting in his private cave on the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan. There is a knock at the door.

Osama: Who is it? More Jehovah's Witnesses, I bet!

Voice: Candygram.

Etc. etc. and pretty soon Osama is sitting in a U.S. Marine encampment, with dozens of paper cuts, and covered head to toe in coarse kosher salt.

Angela Jolie: Wow, and I thought my character in Salt was badass.

**********
Salt is a tough mammajamma, baby.

*I am a fan of Nathan's as well, just not in the same quantities.
**There is the downside of that whole thing about Lot's wife. I'm guessing though that she was fairly unsalty salt.

Somebody Cut Me On Purpose!

2010-08-23T23:45:00.000-05:00

...It's all right though. I paid them to do it.

Before you start to suspect this is all part of some bizarre mystery movie idea, allow me to clarify the situation: I had surgery.

As regular readers of this blog know, Wednesday I had outpatient surgery to repair a double hernia (or as I like to refer to it, a "double turn and cough blowout.") The official description for the surgery is bilateral laproscopic hernia repair. The "bilateral" refers to the fact that they had to repair hernias on both sides. Feel free to grimace. However, when I do something, I go all out. None of this, single-hernia-on-one-side-of-the-crotch-wimp-crap.

The "laproscopy" refers to the fact that it was a hernia repair. At least I assumed that's what it meant. A "lap" scope for a hernia seems very appropriate.

Actually though, it's just the type of scope, as opposed to an arthoscopic repair. I actually have no idea what the difference is. You can always look it up on Wikipedia if it's bugging you.

Now, most people might be a little reluctant to blog about their hernia repair, but as one of my Twitter pals reminded me (bless you @sunjana1) , I don't have much of a filter. And that was before the anesthesia (rim-shot!)

Have no fear, I'll keep it clean. This isn't that kind of a blog. Plus, you may want a little warning well in advance in case you have a similar procedure one day.

The admissions was the usual waiting, punctuated by answering questions, handing off insurance information, and then taking a large vaccuum to the wallet. Actually, it wasn't so bad, and technically I was getting a 2 for 1 special.

We then walked up to the "ambulatory surgery center." Ironically, this is the wing where they do surgeries for people who don't need to be transported by ambulance. I discovered that ambulatory refers to the fact that these patients, including yours truly, can walk, dance a bit, and generally transport themselves before, and to a limited extent after, the surgery. Apparently, it does not mean there would be a little siren on the wheelchair when they took me out. It wasn't even an option.

After some waiting in the appropriately named "waiting room," they called me back to one of the pre-op cubicles. This is a little area with a few chairs, a bed/gurney, and one very flimsy curtain. My wife accompanied me and we sat down for a health screening by the pre-op nurse. 400 questions later, they concluded there were no unforseen risks and the nurse handed me a robe and socks and instructed me to "get naked." Yes, that's a quote.

She then pulled out a camera.

No, just kidding, she then very professionally left me to the business of changing into the traditional hospital surgical robe. This garment is designed to be the most humiliating piece of clothing you'll ever wear. It ties in two places, at the neck and at the waist, both in the back. Of course, they tell you only to tie the neck part as the other part needs to be open. Well, what is the point of the second tie then, people?

I changed into the robe, realizing just as I finished that the whole time I was changing there was a gap in the curtain large enough to drive a steadycam through. Fortunately, there was no steadycam.

At least I also had the lovely socks with the rubber bottoms to add to the ensemble. Also, I got to lay in the gurney/bed thingy, so there was minimal exposure, curtains or no.

That lasts until you have to go to the restroom. You're supposed to fast from food and liquid from midnight before, and I did that, but the human body is notoriously uncooperative in situations accompanied by stress, and what's more stressful than knowing someone's going to cut you open in an hour or so?

So, I had to get up and visit the john. Luckily, I was able to wrap the gown around me in such a way that no one got mooned. I do admit to being a bit disappointed that no one walked by eating a Hot Pocket, so I could reenact the "free-eaters" commercial.

After I returned to the waiting cubicle we waited awhile and the nurse soon returned with the dreaded IV. My daughter has had all kinds of problems with these in the past. However, my nurse quickly and painlessly applied the needle and IV to my left hand and informed me that I could move my hand freely with the IV in it.

"Can I make a fist?" I asked.

"Yes," she politely replied.

"Move my wrist?"

"Yes."

"Macrame? Juggling? Kung Fu? Interpretive hand shadows?"

Unfortunately, she had left before I could get a definitive answer about those.

She returned a few moments later with a syringe and pleasantly announced that it was for my stomach.* My first thought was about the old rabies shots. My second was "Oh, crap!" Actually, as Willy Wonka might say, "Reverse that."

When I regained consciousness (metaphorically speaking) the nurse administered the shot about as painlessly as could be imagined. The actual drug itself though, designed to relax me, stung like rabid wasp venom.

This quickly passed though and soon I was very, very relaxed. So, of course I had to urinate again.

The IV complicated this greatly, as the hand I previously used to hold the robe shut was now occupied with a large bag full of saliene solution. Fortunately, Mrs. Fando was able to accompany me down the hall and help keep the robe closed. It's a good woman who will hold your hospital gown closed for you. Some women would surreptiously flip it open as you walked.

My wife's assistance with the robe was a great relief to me, as there were several kids in the area with their families. My biggest fear at this point wasn't a scalpel; it was a sudden, unfortunate wardrobe malfunction, accompanied by panicked squeals of "Stranger danger!"
One nerve-wracking trip to the toilet later I was back in the bed and feeling nicely medicated.

This was about the precise moment a male nurse arrived with an electric razor.

I'm not going to go into much detail here. (No, really) Suffice to say, body hair gets in the way of a surgeon properly doing his or her job, so it has to be removed. Completely. Given that this was hernia surgery... let's just say that I was no longer in a state of complete relaxation.

However, I now completely understand why they give you the relaxation shot first.

My surgeon stopped by to visit and offer a bit of news. The surgery was delayed a bit, as the patient ahead of me in the OR (or "Operating Room" for those of you who've never watched ER) had a few unforseen minor problems, so we got to wait a little while longer. The surgeon though was the kind of fellow who inspires confidence and so I felt a bit better, knowing he was very expereinced with this kind of surgery. There was utterly no chance of any "Michael Palin-barber-cutting-cutting-CUTTING!" The gentleman is a pro.

It's about at this point that things start to get a little more fuzzy, as the combination of medication and time started to make my mental processes fuzzy.**

I do remember my wife kissing me and being wheeled off into the OR. Wait a sec...dangling modifier there; I was the one wheeled into the OR.

I remember the OR lights and one of the nurses having to climb on the operating table to push down the railing of the gurney I was riding on. She struck me as a very agile young woman. After that I had to slide over to the operating table and the next thing I remember is waking up with a sore abdomen and a foul case of anesthesia-induced nausea.

I vaguely remember dressing. I have no idea whether there were spectators or not. They would have been welcome to help hold me steady.

I remember the wheelchair ride to the front door, mostly because, to my nauseated brain it resembled something akin to a roller coaster with really big back wheels. Disney, Universal, etc. you can skip Wheelchair of Nausea as an upcoming attraction.

I remember my wife driving our SUV through the yard to our front door so I could walk the shortest possible distance to our recliner, where I resided for most of the following 24 hours. After I reclined though, I was out for at least four hours.

I remember little else, which is the beauty of modern surgery. I don't remember being intubated or the cutting or any of the other things done as part of the process. I have three neat little incisions that I don't remember the surgeon making. I don't really remember much of the post-operative instructions we were given in recovery.

I don't even remember why I'm writing this, but I'm assuming it has something to do with finding the lighter side of things, and letting people know that surgery isn't as awful or frightening as one might think. It's not hilariously amusing, but the one thing I can guarantee is that it will leave you in stitches.***

No, I'm not posting photos of them.

*My wife explained later that the nurse told her about the stomach injection while I was in the restroom the first time. Mrs. Fando wisely decided not to mention it to me until the actual moment arrived. Had she done so, I'm sure I would have been fine, but I also would have envisioned a needle about 10 times the size of the one the nurse used.
** For those of you who are regular readers, "fuzzier than usual."
***After three incisions, I felt entitled to that line.

I Can Has Nausea

2010-08-16T00:14:00.001-05:00

A couple of months ago I was reading a Yahoo! Finance/New York Times article about a Web entrepeneur who specializes in "oddball Internet humor." Having a semi-professional* interest in the subject, I was naturally curious.

Now, given the content of this blog, I of all people should not rush to be judgmental about someone else's conceptualization about humor. However, after reading I Can Has Cheezburger I'm beginning to have a slight crisis of confidence. If large, unpleasant cats spouting bizarre Pidgeon English are the vanguard of 21st Century comedy, we ...and by we I mean civilized, educated human beings... are in serious trouble.

There's even a site designed to teach people this ridiculous lingo, dubbed "LOLspeak." Consider it entry #1,545,794 in the evidence for how human civilization is crumbling into a giant pile of dust, sesame seeds, and cat hair. It's the kind of self-consciously "cute" blather that would make even George Herriman's Krazy Kat violently ill. This sort of thing is amusing in small doses (see All your base are belong to us) but in heavier doses, I suspect it can cause seizures.

As an aside, I am not a fan of the term "LOL." This over-used online phrase is often a clear sign of a depressed or angry person's desperation to make themselves seem lighthearted and entertained, much like the person at a party who is manically dancing in a vain attempt to convince others he or she is having a great time when in reality they just broke up with their girlfriend/boyfriend/crack dealer.

Now in fairness, "LOL" is often used legitimately and innocently by people, seeking to convey their appreciation of a joke. (Personally, I prefer the phrase "I nearly peed my pants.) This practice should stop though and I Can Has Cheezburger is perfect evidence as to why: Our stomachs can only handle so much.

Alarmingly, I Can Has Cheezburger is just one of an entire network of Web sites** including:

Acting Like Animals - Pictures and videos of animals acting like animals. That's right, they're actually acting like animals. Frankly, I find the whole thing rather dubious.
Bob's House of Video Games - Apparently, these pictures are related to video gaming ...most of them ...some of them, maybe.
So Much Pun - If the title's any indication, we haven't had this much fun since trowling through the Reader's Digest rejection pile from Laughter, The Best Medicine.
FAIL Blog - Failures, obviously. One of hundreds of these types of sites, but relatively speaking, comedy gold on this network.
Why Do I Live Here? - I'm not sure about this one. Maybe it's a Century 21 parody?
Daily Squee - Daily images of self-consciously cute images. Much like taking hits of pancake syrup mixed with Jolt.
Engrish Funny - A site designed to attract the attention of every ethnic advocacy group in the world. I wouldn't be surprised to find that this replaced an Amos and Andy reboot Web series.
Happy Chair Is Happy - Anthropomorphic items make this lonely looking chair ecstatic. No offense, but that's one desperate chair.
If Shoes Could Kill - Really, really awful shoes. This could frighten the nice people at What Not To Wear or inspire a sequel to Steve Martin's Cruel Shoes, but that's as close to comedy as it gets for me. The shame of it that it wastes a fine title for a novel about a fashion model who happens to be a kung-fu expert.
I Has A Hotdog - For obvious reasons, I decided to skip actually visiting this one.

The sites are completely made up of content that viewers send in, meaning that other people do all the work for the sites' owners. The remarkable thing about this network is that last year it earned seven figures. Seven figures!!!

So tune in next week to try the link to our new, upcoming Web site: I Canna Act Like A Hotdog With Cheezburger Flavored Shoes. Send in your pics and videos!!!

*Technically, the $3.89 we've earned from Google AdSense qualifies.
** The Cheezburger Network, which just has to fry Ronald McDonald's cheese ...or cheez, as it were.

The Lighter Side of Hernias

2010-08-08T22:43:00.000-05:00

For those of you who follow my tweets carefully... OK, I'll start again.

If any of you had been following my tweets carefully, you'd know that I have been diagnosed with a hernia. The specific diagnosis is immaterial other than that it involves failing the "turn your head and cough" test. Also, there will be surgery.* The important thing is to milk this for as much blogging as possible.

Seriously, it's an uncomfortable situation, both physically and socially. I have been playing and running on it but I'm going to have to give that a rest owing to my slight concern about the possibility of part of my small bowel getting caught in a bad position in my nether regions.

As you can see, there's no end of fun to be had writing about this sort of thing.

Anyway, rather than bore you with poetic descriptions of the injury, the quickest way to give you an idea of this minor misery is to show you the list of proposed titles for this post. After reading these, you'll have more than enough information.

Below the Belt
Looking for Bulges in All the Wrong Places
Is That a Hernia or Are You Just Glad to See Me?
How'd My Intestine Get All the Way Over There?
Excuse Me, You're Going to Make an Incision Where?!?
Why I'm So Crotchety, Lately
How to Truss for Success
No, You May Not Film This for Medical Posterity
Earl's Adventures in Underland
Help Me! I've Got an Enormous Abnormal Bulge in My Groin!!

*I plan to tweet as much as possible during the surgery, especially the portions where I'm heavily drugged.

Editorial Note - The World Cup

2010-08-07T23:24:00.001-05:00

I never did get to all those World Cup posts I promised. So, here's a summary of the subjects I neglected:

The refs sucked - Yes they did. Missed goals, offsides that weren't there, really bad haircuts.
FIFA's advertising totalitarianism - If you weren't selling Budweiser (The Official Beer of the FIFA 2010 World Cup!) you might as well be a crack dealer in the eyes of FIFA. One beer company responded by sending scantily clad women into a match. FIFA had the women arrested, though there is a rumor FIFA President Sepp Blatter wants to incorporate their outfits into the uniforms for the Women's World Cup.
The big stars flopped - Rooney, Ronaldo, Messi didn't score. On the bright side, they all had better months than Mel Gibson and Lindsay Lohan.

The Most Interesting Man in the World - Outakes

2010-08-01T14:30:00.005-05:00

(The audio version of this bit is here.)

[Dos Equis Commercial - Recording session - Scene 10]

Director: Dos Equis, Scene 10, Take 1. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I don't always drink beer. Sometimes, I drink orange juice.

Director: Cut.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: Sorry! (to Crew) Sorry! (to Director) I was thinking about that bout of scurvy I had in '69.

Director: OK, no problem. Once more from the top. Dos Equis, Scene 10, Take 2. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I don't always drink beer. On occasion, I'll have a V-8, or a Clamato.

Director: Cut.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I'm sorry, I don't know where my mind is today.

**********

Director: Dos Equis, Scene 10, Take 7. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I don't always drink beer. For example, I'll drink cranberry juice if I'm having a problem with my bowels.

Director: Cut.

**********

Director: Dos Equis, Scene 10, Take 11. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I don't always drink beer. Sometimes, I'll put warm soup in a mug and sip it slowly.

Director: Cut

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I like the way the noodles tickle my moustache.

Director: Cut!

**********

Director: Dos Equis, Scene 10, (deep breath) Take 15. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I don't always drink beer. Sometimes I'll go weeks without one, even months. Often, I don't want a beer at all. In fact, sometimes the taste of beer makes me want to vomit.

Director: Cut!!!

Assistant Director: (under his breath) Why'd you let him go on so long?

Director: (under his breath) I thought he might get round to it this time.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: Are we going to be much longer? I've got a monkey-bathing session at 3 p.m. and it's no fun if the water cools off.

**********

Director: (wearily) Dos Equis, Scene 10, Take 45. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: ...and when you're sewing yourself up without anesthetic, the worst thing is pulling the thread. I usually laugh when I do that, to cover up the crying.

Director: Cut!!!

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I'm sorry, were we rolling?

Director: Yes. Yes, we were %$&! rolling!!!

The Most Interesting Man in the World: Hey, calm down! (Jokily) You don't want me to have to punch you in the face and then have you thank me do...

Director: Don't even try that crap with me, now.

**********

Director: (breezily without the expectation of success) Dos Equis, Scene 10, Take 137. Action.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: I don't always drink beer.But when I do, I prefer Dos Equis. Stay thirsty, my friends, and watch out for those bowel problems.

Director: (Shocked) Cut! Print it! We'll fix it in editing.

The Most Interesting Man in the World: Does anyone have any cranberry juice, handy?

Crazy Diego

2010-07-19T20:02:00.004-05:00

Argentina coach and legendary player* Diego Maradona out on quite a show during the 2010 World Cup. In the space of a couple of weeks he managed to:

Confuse people with constant changes between tracksuits and very, very expensive suits.
Mistake the Golden Boot winner (for the most goals) for a German ballboy.
Insist on press conferences at a single location in South Africa, regardless of where Argentina were playing.
Acted out Beethoven's Ode to Joy every time Argentina scored.
Acted out Wagner's Gotterdamerung every time Argentina got scored on.
Wear out over 70 sets of rosary beads.**
Get into a heated argument with German fans after losing to Germany in the quarterfinals.
Suggested that the reason so many star players failed to perform is that they weren't "selfish" enough ...you know, like he was when he played.

So what's next for Diego Maradrama? Some predictions:

Becomes the spokesperson for Armani's new $1,000 three-piece tracksuit.
Confuses Lionel Messi with Paul Simon and repeatedly asks the Barcelona forward to "play 'Kodachrome.'"
Grows his beard out and joins ZZ Top on a combination blues rock and football tour of Asia.
Becomes infuriated when he finds out that the Jonas Brothers won't be coming back to Argentina for a full three months.
Mistakes FIFA President Sepp Blatter for actress Betty White. Keeps asking Sepp what Mary Tyler Moore was like.
Pranked by Russell Brand into thinking he's being sought to coach the English national team.
Doesn't streak through Buenos Aires, since Argentina didn't win the World Cup, but he does moon a busload of River Plate supporters at a Buenos Aires Wal Mart.
Gets into an argument with Elmo the Muppet during a guest appearance on Sesame Street. Refers to Elmo as a "cheating German mafioso fuzzball."
Becomes addicted to Kelloggs Fruit Loops and takes to appearing in public with a toucan on his shoulder.
Accidentally knocks his friend Fidel out while taking free kicks with casaba melons.
Declares that Nickelodeon cartoon Go Diego Go is based on his professional stint at Napoli and that Baby Jaguar is based on his coke dealer.
Castigates actor Danny DeVito for "looking down on him."
Knocked out of first round of The Next Iron Chef when his receipe for cherries flambe turns out to be a flaming jersey he exchanged with another player after an international match with Spain.
Rehired to coach Argentina through the 2014 World Cup because, as the Argentina Football Association notes, you can't buy publicity like this.

* ...and cocaine fiend, pill-popper, hand-baller, etc.
** This is an estimation.

Vuvuzela Nightmare

2010-07-12T23:39:00.002-05:00

For the most part, some dodgy refereeing and public relations aside, the 2010 FIFA World Cup was fairly successful event. However, one feature of the World Cup was an unmitigated failure: The vuvuzela.

Now, I'm not writing of the actual vuvuzela. That traditional and noble Zulu instrument is made of an antelope horn and according to Wikipedia is used to signal distant villagers to meetings. One vuvuzela served the important purpose of summoning people for miles around. One. That's plenty.

The thousands we heard incessantly throughout the World Cup were cheap, plastic, mass-produced annoyances that had about as much to do with the traditional instrument as a kazoo does with a professional orchestra-class French horn.

The sound a traditional vuvuzela makes is reported to resemble the cry of an elephant. The sound that several thousand kazoos... excuse me, plastic vuvuzelas make in a stadium can be described in several different ways:

A billion buzzing bees
Several thousand people breaking wind simultaneously (Or as some little kids might have asked, "What's with all the dry tooting?")
A particularly windy Robert Mugabe harangue
Several thousand drunken revelers blowing air through a cheap, plastic tube

It's simply a tuneless monstrosity. You can't play anything resembling a melody on it. The only time you'll hear the phrase "that was a smoking vuvuzela" is if some irritated soccer fan sets one on fire.

The sound drowned out the cheers and singing of fans from all over the world. It drowned out players trying to talk to each other. It drowned out players trying to communicate with the referee.* It drowned out television commentators. It even drowned out Cristiano Ronaldo's ego, asking him when he was going to do something worthy of that statue in the Nike commercial.**

It never let up. Ever. Whenever a crowd threatened to break into a song, or a somewhat obscene team chant (or both), the vuvuzela volume would increase exponentially to snuff the sound of human voices out, the way the Death Star did to Alderran in Star Wars.

To quote a Jorge Carlito Viejo poem, the vuvuzela was like the proverbial mime: "He never leave."

As much as I love the majesty of the World Cup, I will be glad for the leagues to start up again so we can hear proper crowd noise. The next time we hear the sound of mass tooting at a soccer event, I hope it's just because the pies from the stadium vendors are particularly "beany."

Some commentators called the vuvuzela "the soundtrack of the 2010 World Cup." For once, I would have preferred a solid month of polka. At least you could dance to it.***

*Admittedly, much of this consisted of swearing.
** To which he sensibly replied, "Hey, I nutmegged Homer Simpson!"
*** Note that I completely omitted the obvious, "The vuvuzela blows" joke. I'm classy like that.

Happy Fun Ball

2010-07-12T22:30:00.000-05:00

(Our belated review/coverage of the World Cup continues...)

Ah, the Jabulani! No, that's not some South African delicacy that you can find at a quaint little restaurant in Bloemfontein. It's the official ball of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. According to everyone, it was an amazing success... if you consider aerodynamic unpredictablity and universal loathing a success.

Everyone got on the anti-Jabulani bandwagon. Goalkeepers hated it because it moved around a lot in the air. However, goalkeepers hate all footballs that don't fly straight into the keeper gloves on contact and stick like warm flypaper.*

Forwards and midfielders hated the ball because it didn't fly true on passes and shots, although this also left them with an easy excuse for the shots that wound up in row 57. A shrug of the shoulders and mouth the word "Jabulani." In all honesty, it's better than the excuses with a more consistent ball, which involve covering one's head and bouncing around like Basil Fawlty.

Coaches hated it because it was a distraction from things like tactics and lineup selections. The press enjoyed getting an easy story on the controversy but hated the ball itself because it was a terrible interview, especially compared to the classic Adidas Tango, which is considered the raconteur of footballs. (Ask it about the "penguin incident" in the '74 World Cup. You won't regret it.)

Fans hated it because it cost a bajillion dollars and so they had to buy the cheap replica ball that didn't do any of the crazy things the real one did. So, for the cost of $25-40 the only privelege you get is to ostentatiously use the word "Jabulani" in casual conversation on the field.

Finally, NASA hated it.

Yes, that NASA.** NASA, being freed up from shuttle missions and other outer space work, discovered that at speeds exceeding 44 mph the ball's flight becomes very unstable and unpredictable. So, essentially, almost every time the ball is shot by world-class players who regularly hit the ball at 60-plus mph, it's going to do something weird ...just like the Mars Polar Lander.

Many people are wondering what the design folks at Adidas were thinking when they produced the Jabulani. I think I have an answer: Jabulani is Zulu for "celebration." Celebrations are happy and fun. Therefore, I have concluded that the Adidas football manufacturers have created the very first "Happy Fun Ball" ever used at a World Cup.

Unfortunately for Adidas, no one remembered one of the most important rules about Happy Fun Ball: "Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball."

* Or the silly string on Warehouse 13.
** As opposed to the National Aeronautics Soccer Association, not that you'd know.

Americans Watching Soccer? Goal!!!

2010-07-05T23:29:00.001-05:00

Oh, yes. Americans are watching soccer and the World Cup. To Glenn Beck's and Jim Rome's horror, millions of people are tuning in and deciding that this World Cup thing and soccer in general are pretty exciting. It helped that the U.S. got into the round of 16 on one of the most exciting finishes to a game in years. And how they cheered across the fruited plain. Don't believe that Americans could be that interested in a soccer match? Then check here.

Some old line about "a sleeping giant awakening" comes to mind. Yes, we went out at the next hurdle, but that sort of pain just motivates us Yanks. Imagine how many American kids saw that moment and decided that's the kind of thing they want to do someday.

Bet some of them will.

France Surrenders!

2010-07-03T13:00:00.002-05:00

One of the biggest shocks of the FIFA 2010 World Cup so far has been the French. No, not the uncontrolled swearing of the players onfield, the French national team. You know you've had a bad World Cup experience when the scandal of your star player being sent off for a head butt in the previous World Cup final is considered a minor oversight compared to the completely idiotic meltdown of the present squad.

It started at the end of qualifying. France finished second in their qualifying group behind Serbia, already a worrying sign for the 2006 runners-up. It was a bit like a Renault Formula One car being outpaced by a souped-up Yugo*. They faced Ireland in a two-match playoff and won on a controversial last minute goal. The goal was controversial because the player who provided the pass for the goal, Arsenal legend Thierry Henry, only managed to make the pass because he controlled the ball with his hand. Twice. France were lucky to get out of Dublin without being beaten to a bloody pulp under a barrage of shillelaghs and hurleys.

FIFA and UEFA, the European soccer confederation, were petitioned by the Irish to overturn the unjust result. They responded in typical fashion, by patiently explaining to the Irish that nothing could be done to ever change the result because the referee's feelings would be hurt, FIFA would find it far more difficult to keep up their Champagne and Brie stocks, and the integrity of the game would be called into question by overruling a call for reasons so trivial as deliberate handball. In response, Ireland declared war on FIFA and France, but the quick military surrender of the latter still did not lead to a change in the results.

So, France were off to the World Cup Finals in South Africa, led by their happy-go-lucky coach Raymond "The Mad Hatter" Domenech (pictured right, in happier times). Domenech had led the team to their impressive runner-up performance in Germany four years earlier, but since then had developed a reputation for eccentricity that Howard Hughes would have found excessive.

It was well known that Domenech often made squad selections based on Astrology. He left Robert Pires out of the squad because he distrusted Scorpios. He also famously proposed to his girlfriend on live television... right after France were bounced out of Euro 2008. I guess he was looking for a silver lining.

The French Football Federation responded by announcing that Domenech would be replaced by highly-respected former French captain Laurent Blanc. However, in order to maintain France's reputation for efficiency and organization, they decided the change would not happen until after the World Cup finals.

After that two members of the French team then treated the international sporting press to a sex scandal involving an underage prostitute. It was almost as though they were trying to see how far they could go on the creepiness scale.

Given the controversy of qualifying, the scandal, and his own lame duck status, Domenech decided a novel approach was needed to World Cup preparation. He booked the team into a swanky Alps resort for a rigorous regimen of dune buggy driving. French center back William Gallas promptly crashed his buggy. Domenech suggested it was because the player's steering wheel was out of alignment with Mars.

Next, the team conspired to lose 1-0 to China in a World Cup warm-up game, a victory so surprising that several Chinese players left the field thinking they'd lost the match and that France were just sulking in victory. The French responded to the loss with internal squabbling about which players should start and whether or not Domenech was, in fact, a gnome.

Eventually, they reached South Africa without anyone being jailed, crushed by a dune buggy, or mortally wounded by an angry wife or girlfriend. They began with a flattering 0-0 draw to Uruguay, flattering in that France looked sleepier than Rip Van Winkle after an especially turkey-heavy Thanksgiving dinner. Had Uruguay not been confused by the impressive looking French jerseys and Franck Ribery's appearance in Nike's big World Cup commercial, they might have scored as many as ten goals.

They brightened up in time to be well-beaten by Mexico, a loss that was doubly ironic because Mexico wore green and white and celebrated both goals with routines from Riverdance. Immediately after the match Ireland officially declared Cinco de Mayo a national holiday.

This was the straw that broke the tenuous back of French sanity. Domenech subbed striker Nicholas Anelka out of the game and the psychotically-disappointed striker suggested his coach get jiggy with himself. He also called Domenech a son of a w****, which given the recent French scandals might have been intended as a term of endearment.

Domenech, relying on Orion's current position and a mysterious telegram from notorious Israeli "psychic" and spoon designer Uri Geller, promptly told Anelka that his own services were no longer required and booked him on the early flight back to Paris, which was especially peculiar as Anelka plays for Chelsea, an English team based in London.

Anelka's teammates, distraught at seeing their teammate kicked off the team and the resulting disruption to the smooth-running French footballing operations, responded by refusing to train. French captain Patrice Evra presented Domenech with a letter from the players, demanding more playing time for bench players and less fortune cookies in the team diet. They also suggested they would have had more respect for Domenech if he'd simply headbutted Anelka and left it at that.

Evra then got into a public argument with the French trainer and the two were only prevented from an entertaining slapfight by the quick thinking Domenech, who suspected that a practice field brawl was not a good idea with Uranus in retrograde**. The French players rewarded him for his peace-making skills by not allowing him back on the team bus. Domenech was forced to hitchhike back to the hotel. Along the way, he lost the napsack containing all his star charts.

France lost their final group match, with South Africa, 2-1. This elated the South Africans and made their departure from the tournament somewhat more bearable. The French Football Federation however had reached their limit. They immediately booked the team on a flight home, flying coach. The Federation spokesperson stated, "We wanted to fly them back via Ryan Air, to really punish them, but they don't travel this route."

Domenech, for his part, refused to shake the hand of Carlos Alberto Parreira, the Brazilian coach of South Africa. He then refused to explain his actions to the press, suggesting that they were extraterrestials. He did however provide them with a group palm reading and a seance.

The "piece de resistance" was a press conference with Zinedine Zindane, who so notoriously got sent off from the 2006 World Cup final. Zidane was asked about the turmoil and responded that it was a pity. At least someone in the French footballing world has a sense of proportion.

*Yes, I know Serbia is better than that and even beat Germany in the group stages of the finals. I couldn't resist the Yugo joke.
** Send in your own joke responses to this line and we'll publish the best. This article is already too long.

So, How About that World Cup?

2010-07-01T00:00:00.002-05:00

I'm sure a lot of you have been checking this site daily, wondering bemusedly to yourself, "Haven't they pulled this crap from Blogspot, yet?" Thanks for your support ...jerks.

Others of you have occasionally stumbled by here and wondered why I haven't posted anything of significance on the World Cup. Well, it's because I've been watching the hell out of the thing, that's why.*

It's been an exciting run so far, albeit with the usual adornment of FIFA incompetence, player petulance, and fan silliness. Check that, there has been more than the usual fair share of that this year. The world's biggest sporting tournament has been positively a gold mine for writers, comedians, and psychologists. So, what have been the big stories this year, so far?

Well, I'll be getting to that shortly! I promise! Here's what you can look forward to:

The Refs Suck
France Surrenders
Cover that Ad!
Happy Fun Ball
Big Stars, Little Performances
Vuvuzela Nightmare
Crazy Diego
Americans Watching Soccer? Goal!!!

And more, as I find the time and energy during days with no games on.

*And also running and playing soccer, myself. Did I mention I'm down to about 178 pounds. No? Well, I am!