New Year's and Old Year's

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.

Resolutely Into the New Year

Well, it's been a bloody awful year blogging-wise. Stew posted a grand total of one time, I think, and that was just by accident as he thought he was sending in his taxes electronically. Nuffy posted a few times, but many of those were just political shilling for Pip Clowson (Did he win? I didn't follow the election that closely.) I wasn't much better myself. The annual "Best of DOUI" post will be thinner than usually.

However, it's a new year and a new opportunity to begin anew with new posts and a new attitude and a commitment to really overusing the word new. As is traditional around here, some resolutions for the new year follow. For those of you playing along at home, score yourself based on how many of these you spot that we break before January 7th.

**********

Earl Fando's New Year's Resolutions for 2009

• Post more often and get the whole crew to post more often as well. Encourage them, praise them, offer gentle words of support, and then badger and humiliate them if they falter, just like the professional, paid editors do.
  
  
• Give up smoking. (Oh, sorry... that's from President Obama's New Year's Resolutions list. I've never so much as lit up. I have this cough, you see, and...)
  
  
• Learn the rules to jai alai. If one is to mock something, one should at least understand it somewhat... a little... I may glance through the Wikipedia entry... the heading at least.
  
  
• Eat more marmite.
  
  
• Play at least one game of Risk, just to show I can still roll a mean dice.
  
  
• Get fitter. The Fandos have gotten a Wii Fit this year and I will try to get the most out of the silly thing as I can before the next debilitating back injury.
  
  
• Mock Wii Fit every step of the way... Turnabout is fair play after all. The thing mocks me every time I step on it.
  
  
• Get the new blog template up and all the changes that go with it, instead of merely alluding to it every 4 months*
  
  
• Try not to go mental every time Arsenal don't take three points. I mean, it's only a game right; even if they can't manage a &^%$ing goal against &%$#ing Stoke City. What in %$#& happened to the %$#&ing defence??? $%#&!!!! Right... I'll work on that.
  
  
• Actually play the edition of Football Manager on my PC, instead of just staring at it the way a hungry raccoon eyes a wastebin.
  
  
• More prank phone calls to celebrities and politicians... I still haven't tried out my Joe Biden impersonation on Barbara Streisand. "What's that Mr. Vice-President? You think James [Brolin] looks like a fat zombie? Well (passage deleted) and your mother!" Oh, how she'll chuckle when she realises it's not the Veep. Not that I'll tell her.
  
  
• Use more footnotes**
  
  
• Get active on Facebook. Who doesn't have time for yet one more scarcely-visited web site?
  
  
• Learn to play the bagpipes in a variety of creative ways***
  
  
• Finally play Oliver in As You Like It
  
  
• Learn to speak Japanese so I can tell what the presenters are really saying in Ninja Warrior (or Sasuke). I suspect it's much more colourful. ("Sa!!!!")
  
  
• Get a style guide for THE blog.
  
  
• Finish my paint by numbers canvas of Guernica.
  
  
• Try to actually enjoy Dick Clark's Rockin New Year's Eve, despite the fact the studio portions were obviously filmed in July.
  
  
• Make next year's resolutions list much funnier.
  

* As in now, for instance.
** As if that will help.
*** Get your minds out of the gutter people, I was referring to salsa music.