A Nameless Blog

Another year has come to an end, which means we should take that time to reflect.  This year, that won’t be the most pleasant experience, as 2011 has been one of the worst years in memory both globally and personally.  At least I can start off 2012 right by making snarky jokes about all the important events that occurred in the year prior.  As always, please know that all the events described below happened exactly as I choose to remember them.  Let’s get started, shall we?
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JANUARY

In one of the worst possible ways for a nation to kick off a new year, a lone assassin opens fire on a Fry’s parking lot in Tucson, wounding 17 and killing six, including federal district judge John Roll.  Narrowly surviving the attack was Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who suffered a bullet wound to the head.  Doctors say the brain damage she incurred will limit her speech and motor functions for some time, but that she will still be “more functional and qualified” than over half of her colleagues in Congress.

The Auburn Tigers defeat the Oregon Ducks 22-19 in college football’s BCS Championship Game.  Soon after, a disgruntled Alabama Crimson Tide fan is caught poisoning the forests of Oregon because the Ducks “didn’t do their job”.

Revolution mounts in Egypt, where president Hosni Mubarak calls for a military presence in the streets of Cairo.  The army’s presence is unsuccessful because protestors had foreknowledge of their arrival thanks to Mubarak’s use of the hashtag #TanksToMasses in a tweet from the night before.

FEBRUARY

The Green Bay Packers defeat the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25 to win Super Bowl XLV.  Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers wins the game’s MVP, but gives credit to his team’s defense for thwarting Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger’s advances with its “No Means No” formation.

Teachers and state employees in Wisconsin mount protests in response to new governor Scott Walker’s plan to limit their bargaining rights.  Most egregious to protestors was a plan to cut teachers’ pay 1% for every hour-long DVD played in class.

Retail book chain Borders files for bankruptcy, effectively ending over 40 years in business.  Borders representatives blame their failure on the rise in digital media as well as the sudden drop in quality from authors like Michael Crichton, Kurt Vonnegut, and David Foster Wallace.

A 6.3-magnitude earthquake rattles Christchurch, New Zealand, killing at least 70 people.  Relief packages come from the world over, including from Haiti, which attempts to send over half its population as “volunteers” in a transparent attempt to get out of Haiti.

MARCH

Apple releases the iPad 2.  The new device’s chief improvement upon the original is the number “2″ included on the display, causing thousands of rabid Apple consumers to dispose of their original iPads and wait outside for days to replace them.

Communications giant AT&T buys T-Mobile for $39 billion.  An AT&T spokesman says the company chose to purchase T-Mobile because many of the shareholders “wanted to get a crack at that girl in the commercials”.

People quickly forget about New Zealand when an earthquake hits Japan, causing a 23-foot tsunami to ravage much of the country’s northern shore.  Among the damaged buildings is the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, which is soon recorded as a disaster on par with Adam Sandler’s Jack and Jill.

A deadly earthquake hits Myanmar, killing more than 70 people.  Unfortunately for Myanmar, the world declares itself too “earthquaked out” to provide any sort of relief.

APRIL

A protracted budget dispute puts the United States federal government in danger of shutdown.  The shutdown is narrowly avoided due to a key bipartisan compromise: the federal government will still provide funds to various groups that provide abortions, but will outlaw abortions for any would-be mothers whose children would end up “more likely to vote Republican”.

A large hole opens up in the roof of a Boeing 737 during a Southwest Airlines flight from Sacramento to Phoenix.  The plane makes an emergency landing in Yuma, Arizona, but no one is injured.  Passengers report that the experience was frightening, though not nearly as soul-crushing as spending time in Yuma.

In an elaborate and wasteful ceremony, Prince William marries longtime girlfriend Kate Middleton at Buckingham Palace.  The pretty wedding with the pretty royals is reportedly viewed by over 3 billion people worldwide.  Meanwhile, the same 3 billion people continue to wonder why world leaders take advantage of them.

MAY

US Navy Seals kill notorious terrorist Osama bin Laden at his palatial manor in Abbottabad, Pakistan.  The raid was met with a modicum of international controversy because of Seal Team Six’s decision to have actor Kiefer Sutherland fire the fatal shot.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, head of the International Monetary Fund, is indicted on charges of sexual abuse and attempted rape.  Strauss-Kahn had been a front-runner to succeed Nicolas Sarkozy as president of France.  In light of the charges, he is immediately considered the front-runner to succeed Italian president Silvio Berlusconi.

Former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announces his separation from wife Maria Shriver after 25 years of marriage.  The subsequent divorce papers cite “infidelity” as the main reason for the split, mentioning that Schwarzenegger had fathered secret babies with his maid, the family babysitter, a local sports broadcaster, former WWE wrestler Chyna, his press secretary, and actor Tom Arnold.

Television mainstay America’s Most Wanted is cancelled by the Fox network after 23 years on the air and 1151 fugitives captured.  The show is put back on the air after less than a month, however, when Rupert Murdoch’s wallet is stolen from a New York City Starbucks.

Professional wrestling great “Macho Man” Randy Savage dies of a heart attack at the age of 58.  His wife blamed his death on the brutality of the wrestling business and the fifty-per-day Slim Jim diet that the company faithfully provided as part of his endorsement contract.

JUNE

The Dallas Mavericks defeat the Miami Heat in six games to win the NBA championship.  The Mavericks’ improbable victory over the Heat came due to Finals MVP Dirk Nowitzki’s strategy to have sex with Heat star LeBron James’s mother after the third quarter of every game.

The Boston Bruins defeat the Vancouver Canucks in seven games to win NHL’s Stanley Cup.  In reaction, riots break out in the streets of Vancouver, thus establishing “losing at hockey” as the only thing that makes Canadians violently angry.

New York Congressman Anthony Weiner resigns after it is revealed he had sent pictures of his genitalia to female staffers over Twitter and Facebook.  The internet momentarily implodes making “wiener” puns.

The state of New York legalizes same-sex marriage, becoming the largest state thus far to do so.  Anti-gay activists’ fears are immediately fulfilled when New York concurrently proposes requiring all high schoolers to have “at least one gay experience” before earning a diploma.

A 600-square-mile wildfire spreads through eastern Arizona in the largest fire in the state’s history.  Firefighters fail to extinguish the blaze, but do manage to convince it to move to New Mexico because of the milder weather and perceived availability of methamphetamines.

JULY

The Republic of South Sudan declares its independence from Sudan, forming Africa’s 785th nation.  High school geography teachers in the United States are told to ignore the news, lest the district be forced to buy new maps.

NewsCorp CEO Rupert Murdoch shuts down London newspaper News of the World in response to a continuing investigation that the paper had engaged in phone hacking and police bribery in order to investigate stories.  In the hopes of seeing a similarly drastic house-cleaning, an angry blogger at zazzumplop.com tells police that his phones were hacked by Us Weekly, People Magazine, and Cat Fancy.

After years of a vacillating sentiment between ridicule and apathy, society decides it loved singer Amy Winehouse all along.

Space Shuttle Atlantis completes its final mission, thus ending NASA’s decades-long Space Shuttle program.  With no more Shuttle missions, American astronauts will no longer be able to use the line, “up like a rocket, in like a plane” when picking up women.

AUGUST

For the first time in its history, Standard & Poor’s downgrades the US’s credit rating from AAA to AA+.  Americans are left only to wonder how much foreign cash they would have to destroy in order to drop down to a B.

Google acquires Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion.  Because Motorola Mobility owns over 17,000 patents, the acquisition gives Google a chance to join the cell-phone and tablet markets, as well as to finally perfect that in-car record player that gave Motorola its start.

Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann wins the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa with 4,823 votes.  The remaining population of Iowa releases a formal statement to the other 49 states begging them not to kick Iowa out of the Union.

The people of London decide it’s their turn to riot in the streets.  Rather than overthrow the government or reject the Royal Family, Londoners instead act out against perceived economic distress by destroying their own city.  Surprisingly, the riots work — the burned buildings reveal a stockpile of gold bullion that is shared equally among all of England’s peasant class.

SEPTEMBER

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia grants women the right to vote.  He cleverly never mentions whether women’s votes would be counted.

Contaminated cantaloupe from Colorado causes an outbreak of Listeria, killing at least 15.  Fears of Listeria results in such a sharp decline in sales of Listerine that Johnson & Johnson renames its antiseptic mouthwash “Trichonosia”.

Hundreds of protestors rally near New York’s Wall Street in a peaceful-but-stubborn movement fittingly called “Occupy Wall Street”.  When asked what cause they championed, protestors said that until economic indisparity, unethical practices by banks, shady lobbying in Washington, and government bailouts of large corporations come to an end, they would remain in Zuccotti Park.  They are not expected to leave until the sun supernovas and destroys Earth.

The United States military officially ends its “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy with regard to homosexuals.  A majority of enlisted members support the decision to end the discriminatory practice, although many members’ personal “I’d Rather Not Hear About That” policies remain in effect.

OCTOBER

Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, dies of pancreatic cancer at the age of 56.  Doctors had been notified of Jobs’s “20% Life Remaining” alert some time before, but were never able to find a suitable adapter.

Libyan president Moammar Qaddafi is captured and killed by rebel troops in his hometown of Surt.  Brutal as the killing is, it is nothing compared to the argument that ensues regarding how to spell Qaddafi’s name on his tombstone.

European Union leaders led by Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s Nicolas Sarkozy come to an agreement to help alleviate their ongoing financial crisis.  Despite many safety nets, embattled Greece objects to the agreement, mostly due to the EU’s refusal to recognize feta as legal currency.

Fitting for a year that ends in a 1, the 2011 World Series is thrilling, with the St. Louis Cardinals defeating the Texas Rangers in seven games.  Most credit for the victory goes to Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa, who uses five different pitchers (and 52 minutes) to retire one batter, backup catcher Yorvit Torrealba.

NOVEMBER

Former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky is arrested on multiple counts of sexual abuse of minors.  Sandusky is later acquitted by a Pennsylvania jury because of his role in the 1986 national championship season.  Members of the 1986 Miami Hurricanes are later seen muttering, “yeah, we were the bad guys that year…”

Another casualty of the European financial crisis, Italian president Silvio Berlusconi steps down from office after his country is no longer able to pay off the debt it owes to Berlusconi’s prostitutes.

Dr. Conrad Murray is convicted of involuntary manslaughter for his role in the death of Michael Jackson.  Murray is sentenced to four years in prison, which experts say is sure to deter him from administering recreational anesthetic to any more mentally unstable, super-rich clients he might have in the future.

Duke University’s Mike Krzyzewski overtakes Bob Knight as college basketball’s winningest head coach.  The achievement forces trivia-question writers to consider what level of misspelling or mispronunciation would be acceptable.  The consensus is that spelling “Shusheffsky” would be acceptable, but saying “Ker-zuh-zew-ski” would not.

DECEMBER

After a fifth woman comes forward with sexual harassment allegations, presidential hopeful Herman Cain suspends his campaign.  In his announcement, Cain states, “if you wanna get through this recession, America, you’re gonna have to earn it.  Now let me rub that Gulf of yours…”

By winning the Heisman Trophy, Baylor University quarterback Robert Griffin III becomes the first person in Waco to do something memorable since David Koresh.

An unknown asshole breaks down the door of the world’s greatest blogger and steals his MacBook, forcing him to tap out his beloved “Year in Review” post on an office computer.  The public outcry is so intense that the perpetrator is found within weeks and is flayed alive by a mob of angry, knife-wielding intellectuals.
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Well, there you have it.  Good riddance, twenty-eleven, you dickface.  Welcome twenty-twelve, which shall give us the Olympics and… oh fuck — doomsday bullshit and a presidential election.  It’s gonna be another long year.

-Darrell

Barnes & Noble has an extensive puzzle section.  Classic jigsaws with landscapes, anatomical diagrams, the periodic table, airplanes, frogs, horses, dinosaurs, dragons.  Simple puzzles boast “large pieces!” while others purport to be “so goddamn difficult you’ll hurl the table against the wall, scattering the pieces across the room and behind your couch so that even if you had had the slightest hope of solving it in the first place, the now-missing pieces officially drop the likelihood to Zero”.  A boy of large brushstrokes scratches a scruffy puppy as they look absently leftward.  A cat stares blankly through the circuitous gradations as it is slowly assembled, whisker-by-face-chunk.  The familiar print of all umpteen thousand Simpsons characters is now in globe form, ready for assembly.  Also spherical is a whale next to an equally spherical set of squares, stairs, and sharp angles that elicited in the designer’s pitch repeated use of the word “Escheresque” (though obviously NOT Escher for why bother with licensing when any shlub can draw stairs and make them more colorful anyway).  An eclectic assortment of buildings, marbles, and geegaws splayed out on a canvas Waldo-style though obviously NOT penned by Handford or arranged by that I Spy guy or hatched in the mind of a depressive neo-neo-Dadaist collage artist.  Only women Of A Certain Age shop for puzzles.  Some thoughtless 300-piece knickknack for a nephew, a 5000-piecer for the husband too boring to golf.  A Tom Waits album plays in full at an acceptable volume.  His voice of rust and phlegm fits oddly but perfectly as a fortyish woman picks up a Snoopy puzzle, muses, puts it down.  Each puzzle shrink-wrapped in the same thin polyolefin you tore open when first playing Scattergories or Sequence or Scrabble.  The polyolefin protects the factory-new puzzle pieces from the elements, our hands, the toxic coffee-stained air.  It is chaotic in its airtight peace.  Every piece is in its box, but none is where it belongs.  Every piece on top of every other in a dark formless pile that makes no picture.  The boxes’ outsides hint at what is hidden inside, but tell nothing of the frustration.  ‘Find the corners and edges first’, he says to himself, a man with a plan.  Build the border, arrange like colors, use the picture on the box to cheat but not too often.  ‘Why in em-effing hell doesn’t any piece fit with this one?  I tried every one.’  So fixated on that one yellow piece was he that he really did try to match it up with every other piece on the table.  Halfway through this hard-headed mission, he forced two unmatched ones too firmly, misshaping both of them, but not enough that his tired eyes would notice.  He passed over the piece’s proper mate seventeen times, attempting to get the whopperjawed slivers of printed cardboard to ease into each other like a tongue and groove, or a drake’s member and a weary duck’s snaking cloaca.  No such luck.  He should move on.  Pick a different piece, let the rest fall into place.  This novice puzzler lacks that kind of patience.  He started it out of a misplaced duty to make use of all gifts mailed from his mother in Scottsdale.  Sweat beading on his forehead, he finally gives up, hurling the table and its contents against the wall, thus plummeting the likelihood of completion to that aforementioned Zero.  To the medicine cabinet he walks, knowing that as small and maddening as a puzzle piece can be, it is nothing compared to the relief provided by those round, even-smaller pieces that keep him together.

-Darrell

Hello everyone.  Mike Randolph here.  Remember me?  Back in ’06, I ran unsuccessfully as a write-in candidate for District 12 of my state’s Senate.  In ’08, I ramped up the stakes, launching my first (and so far only) campaign for President of the United States.  In case you haven’t noticed, I did not win that day in November and thus the Randolph administration will have to wait.

I hear the clamoring from the millions of readers Darrell promises me he has: “Why, Mr. Randolph, aren’t you running for President this time around?”  I understand your desires — Obama has disappointed, and none of those Republican nominees puts dynamite in your trousers, either.  Frankly, I’m staying out of the race because even as terrible as the candidates are, I know I’d have no shot.  It’s hard enough to beat an incumbent President, but when you throw in the dozens of major candidates from the competing party, there just isn’t enough space in the political kiddie pool for the internet’s favorite Independent Thinker.  Call me again in 2016.

What am I up to instead?  You’re looking at it.  That’s right, the tables have turned.  Instead of my wife paying Darrell to advertise on his site, he’s now paying me to write opinion pieces.  As you might have heard, Randolph’s Auto Body had to close its doors after forty-three years of service; I appreciate Darrell’s generosity in allowing me to supplement my income by doing what I love most — writing about what’s wrong with America.

So let’s begin, shall we?

As part of my research for my new gig, I went onto YouTube to watch a couple of the Republican debates.  I couldn’t be bothered to watch all of them.  Sitting attached to a computer after about one-and-a-half of those things makes me go stir-crazy.  I can tell you, though, that I feel like I have a good handle on at least the candidates they allow to speak every now and again.  (I’m still not sure who John Huntsman is… for all I know, he’s a holographic experiment developed in a lab.)

Michele Bachmann, mid-debate, said something I couldn’t believe.  She insisted that the day Obama was elected, gasoline cost $1.79 per gallon.  [Ed. note: she really said this; I even played it back to be sure I heard it right. -DJ]  Unless Bachmann thinks Obama was elected in the mid-nineties, she is pulling numbers out of her ass, hoping at least one voter believes her.  It reminds me of a time when, back at Randolph’s Auto Body, a woman tried to pay only five bucks for an oil change.  “Last time I was here, it was five dollars!” she insisted.  “Lady,” I had to tell her, “I own this place and I can tell you that we’ve never charged only five bucks for an oil change, not even as a promotion.  Please pay the $21.95 and leave.”  She raised a bigger stink, but paid when I threatened to call the police.  Come to think of it, that woman had crazy eyes and Minnesota plates.  Could it have been…?  Nah.  Right?  That’s just too coincidental.

Herman Cain has a lot of qualities I like — he’s a businessman, a hard worker, a self-starter.  He’s a leader of men (or at least, restaurant owners).  He’s plain-spoken and he’ll instantly lower everyone’s taxes with a wave of a hand.  I only wish I came up with something as catchy as the 9-9-9 plan.  My proposal to cut every American’s taxes in half was briefly called the “Half-Off Plan”, but soon enough, detractors started calling me “The Half-off Jack-off”, so I abandoned that little name.

Anyway, back to Herman Cain: my problem with him, not surprisingly, regards his character.  As my wife, Winnie, once said, don’t dig for clams if you’re not near the shore.  Mr. Cain was, to extend the metaphor, somewhere between Lincoln and Omaha.  That kind of presumption is uncouth and ungentlemanly, and not the kind of behavior you’d see in a future Randolph presidency.

My favorite thing about Newt Gingrich is his fantastic snowy hair.  Reminds me of when Winnie and I third-honeymooned in Telluride.  His voice, though, reminds me of the time my truck got stolen in Georgia, so on the surface level, I have mixed feelings about him.  Beneath the surface, I’m similarly conflicted.  He made a name for himself with the Contract with America, which is just my kind of earnest political gimmick… but had the unfortunate side-effect of strengthening the Republicans and further entrenching the plutocratic two-party system that I’ve been fighting ever since the city denied my grandmother’s burial rights.  Gingrich’s success in the Nineties was a precursor to Dubya’s strategy in ’04: win the election by rallying the base, rally the base by dividing the nation.  That’s not the Randolph way.

The candidate most of my friends ask me about is Texas Congressman Ron Paul.  They see a lot of similarities between the two of us — we both want to end as many wars as possible, and we both hope to dismantle the government from within.  [Ed. note -- Also, they both often foolishly use phrases such as "dismantle the government from within" thinking they will be interpreted as they intend.  -DJ]  He’s my personal favorite, mostly because he strikes me as the most politically genuine candidate.  My problem with him, though, is that he wants to go back to the Gold Standard.  Why shouldn’t we arbitrarily decide what our money is worth?  Isn’t that better than risking foreign powers invading us to steal our gold?

What do I know about Rick Perry?  Well, he’s a Texas governor with a big head and a thick tongue.  He’s also responsible for a lot of deaths — he’s a little too proud to have executed more people than anyone else on the stage.  It’s unseemly for obvious reasons, but it’s also creepily smug.  Just so Perry stops bragging, I want Michele Bachmann to one-up him by poisoning illegal immigrants and wearing their fingers on a necklace.

Finally, the eventual winner, Mitt Romney.  Why is Romney the eventual winner?  Same reason John Kerry was the Democrats’ eventual winner in ’04.  Voters will flirt with interesting choices for awhile, leaving scattered groups of supporters for each candidate until each candidate eventually shows his/her inexperience.  Just as Wesley Clark changed his mind about Iraq, Herman Cain couldn’t recall his thoughts on Libya.  Just as Howard Dean screamed and made everyone uncomfortable, Rick Perry forgot the third part of his three-part slashing plan.  Just as Dennis Kucinich was earnest and smart, but crazy, the Republicans got Ron Paul.  Then that leaves the mildly embarrassed former niche supporters to say “Oh shit, now whom do I vote for?”  The last man standing in each instance was / will be the familiar, politically polished, smooth-talking, I’ll-say-whatever-you-want-me-to-say, sure-I’m-religious-but-let’s-not-talk-about-that, I’m-such-a-good-politician-I-misplaced-my-spine, the-only-real-hope-to-maybe-beat-the-incumbent-in-a-debate-but-who’s-kidding-really candidate.  It’s the Empire Strikes Back or Rocky II of politics — same movie, different side ends up winning.  Congratulations, America — you’re still gobbling up sequels and demanding nothing more.

Your Frustrated Future President,
Mike Randolph

I’ve made a gigantic personal decision.  I’m going to join the Occupy Wall Street movement.  This time next week, I’ll be on a plane to New York City to be a part of what will surely be a world-changing event.  It might take weeks, months, or even years of peeing in discarded water bottles, but it’s time that the fat-cats in charge are taught a lesson.

What lesson, you ask?  Well… remember those ridiculous bank bailouts from a few years ago?  The ones I said from the beginning were a bad idea?  Economy’s still in the shitter, ain’t it?  What about the same thing I said about bailing out Chrysler and GM?  If we’re truly a capitalist society, we should let failing companies fail.  I don’t want a Chrysler; I haven’t seen anyone under 75 driving one in quite some time.  Why should that company still be around, while my friend Mike Randolph’s body shop had to shut its doors last year?  It’s not fair!  A mere one percent of the people — bunches of faceless, formless people — made a series of understandably selfish, but wholly unwise decisions that led to this nebulous mess we’re in right now!  What better way to teach them a lesson than to ruin public spaces that were formerly enjoyed by us 99-percenters?

As is the case for most Occupy protestors, my personal reasons for going to the Occupy Wall Street movement go well beyond bailouts I don’t understand in the first place.  I’ve been told that anyone’s views are welcome as long as they’re loud enough and in bold letters on posterboard.  So if you see the footage on CNN, watch for me holding any one of the following signs:

POLITICIANS = BAD

BANKER$ ARE GREEDY (see what I did there with the dollar sign?)

ELIMINATE THE DESIGNATED HITTER

TEACH GRAMMAR TO YOUR CHILDREN

YELLING IMPOTENTLY WILL SOLVE ALL OUR PROBLEMS

DYE YOUR HAIR, OBAMA!

VODKA DOES NOT BELONG IN A MARTINI

Those signs will do, I think.  I’ll be sure to bring extra posterboard and markers just in case I get some new inspiration.

Man, I hope this works.  There will be so many of us, Congress will have no choice succumb to our demands.  I just hope they make eliminating the designated hitter a priority (fingers crossed!).

-Darrell

It’s time for that podcast-related post that I promised all those lazy months ago.  If you know me, you’re well aware that podcasts have become my chief source of entertainment these days.  Since I listen to so many of them, I wasn’t sure how to approach a post about them.  If I go exhaustive, nobody would want to read it.  When that happens, it usually means I should fall back on my old friend, the blogpodge.  Let’s begin.

I tweeted this earlier (@zazzumplop, by the way), but last week’s live episode of The Adam Carolla Show (feat. Dov Davidoff) had everything a great Carolla show has — an annoyed account of a personal story that evolves into an anti-bureaucratic rant; Bald Bryan being generally funny, but still managing to shoehorn a couple bad sound effects into the conversation; Alison Rosen being as sharp as ever; and of course, plenty of talk about booze and pornography.  If you’ve never listened, try this episode on for size.

At the beginning of every episode of Sklarbro Country, the Sklar Bros. read some of their fanmail.  One letter told of a man who recently got engaged to a woman who 1) gave him a Sklarbro Country T-shirt for Valentine’s Day, and 2) bought surprise plane tickets to Nashville so they could see the Sklars live.  My first thought: what a great and thoughtful thing to do; that’s a lucky man.  My second thought: goddammit, he took the only good one.

One of the highlights of my week is the end of every Doug Loves Movies when Doug Benson makes his guests play the Leonard Maltin Game (very basic description: think the bidding round of Name That Tune with actors in movies instead of notes in music).  Recently, he’s been tweaking the rules a bit in hopes of improving the game and speeding things up.  As an avid Benson fan and a game-show junkie, I finally found a subject on which I truly have strong opinions.  I realize that approximately zero of my readers have heard a second of this podcast, so I won’t go into details.  Just know that as milquetoast as I sometimes am, I will fuck you up in a discussion about proper administration of a movie-trivia game invented by a stoner comedian.

Who else is a member of the Larry Miller Drinking Society?  Why not?  You have envelopes — self-address one o’ them bitches and send it to California!

Now a list of things I wouldn’t have if it weren’t for The Joe Rogan Experience: A desire to float in a sensory-deprivation tank.  A better appreciation for mixed martial arts.  A deep curiosity about hallucinogens.  The knowledge that eagles can kill wolves.  Mere knowledge of Joey Diaz’s existence. …And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  I think this counts as personal growth.  Then again, I also never would have yelled impotently at something stupid said by Rogan’s co-host or watched a clip of a man’s suicide, so I guess I should take the bad with the good.

On Mike and Tom Eat Snacks Michael Ian Black and Tom Cavanagh host a variety show for at-risk youths… okay, they eat snacks.  The brilliance isn’t in their opinions on the snacks, mind you (e.g., how the hell does Snickers earn a 10?  It’s not even a 10 as a candy bar), but in their odd, mildly combative rapport.  Listen to the “back-to-back-to-back” discussion in the Fig Newton episode and see what I mean.  Consider me an avid viewer (and I know I’m not a viewer).

Bill Simmons has been launching his new site Grantland.com, which is more than a worthwhile read.  Unfortunately, this means we’ve been getting fewer and fewer episodes of The B.S. Report.  Even worse, two of the more recent episodes have been about reality television and the women’s World Cup.  No matter how funny Simmons and his guests can be, it won’t change that I hate reality TV, I don’t care about soccer, and I sure as shit don’t care about women’s soccer.  ESPN’s attempts to give me Soccer Stockholm Syndrome (Soccholm Syndrome?) shall never work!

The show’s still great, but Comedy Death Ray was such a better name than its new one (Comedy Bang! Bang!).  Yep, I’m a holdout.  It’s Bank One Ballpark, Sears Tower, and Comedy Death Ray Radio.  Dammit.

The Pod F. Tompkast evidently is on a small hiatus, so I’m not expecting episode 13 to come out like clockwork on the first of the month.  It’s a pity, too, because I need to know how exactly Ice-T’s project with Andrew Lloyd Weber, the Cake Boss, Mr. Brainwash, John Lithgow, and John C. Reilly ended up undiscovered.  With folks like that involved, I can’t believe it’s not bigger than Star Wars by now.

I know that some day I’ll be asked to be on Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show and talk about my career in showbiz.  Accordingly, I’m already prepared with a Larry King Game (in which the guest intones a bad Larry King impression, says something embarrassingly personal, then throws it over to the phones): “Vanna White on the show tonight; I once lost a pair of dentures inside a Cambodian ladyboy.  Medicine Hat, Alberta, you’re on the air!”

You do realize that there is still a crapload of podcasts I’ve listened to that I’m not even mentioning here, right?  Don’t worry, I’ll stop your suffering.  If you need me, I’ll be wearing purple earbuds and pacing around my backyard.

-Darrell

There might be a problem with the link you requested.  It is associated with no known file on this server.

Perhaps the link is outdated.  For us, most unused links get archived and wiped out after two years, and we’ve been running this server for over twelve.  There’s a good chance that if you’re looking for, say, an unread opinion piece on Leon Panetta, well, it’s probably gone into the archives in the secret servers we keep within the salt mines of Austria.  Weep not for unpopular opinion pieces.  They lack agency, they sucked in the first place, and they’ll enjoy the cool, salty air far beneath Europe for the rest of their virtual days.

Maybe the link isn’t outdated per se, but still got deleted for whatever reason.  As mentioned, we tend to keep things for about two years, but even young articles sometimes disappear.  When this happens, it’s usually to prevent some sort of legal trouble.  For example, we once falsely accused a Congressman of torturing and eating his childhood dog; our parent company was served a libel suit and the post went away.  Then again, it could just have been an article that was posted in error.  Say, a mischievous virus posted bomb-making instructions, or one of our writers plagiarized a piece.  When we catch it, we take it down.

Perhaps you or someone you love mistyped the URL.  This website tends to have crazy-long URLs as it is — if you tried to type it manually, I’d almost guarantee that this is your problem.  We use so many question marks, dots, forward slashes, and strings of patternless characters in our web addresses that if you even attempted to type one of our links manually, we would suggest seeking neurological help.  (Also, if CTRL-C and CTRL-V mean nothing to you, find a website that’s more your speed.  Start with TMZ.com and go from there.)

Did you try to read the profile of a user on our message boards?  If so and you see this error, the user has likely been deleted.  He might have been a spambot trying to optimize the phrases “viagra casino” and “cuckolding nuns”.  He might have been a jerk who abused the peaceful, respectful air this message board encourages.  Or, he could have been an out-and-out troll, baiting our less patient users into responding to intentionally upsetting hate-speech or bald-faced lies.  N.B.: when Godwin’s Law applies, somebody’s getting deleted.

Those are the most likely reasons you are seeing this error.  If none of those seem to apply, perhaps a demon lives inside your computer.  He normally doesn’t make much of a fuss, but he’s a capricious demon; sometimes, without explanation, he’ll decide you aren’t allowed to read a certain page.  If this is the case, pour two cups of holy water on your motherboard.  That should clear up the problem right away.

-Darrell

Today, I decided I wanted to post something, but I didn’t have any ideas.  I solicited my roommate for one, and his suggestion was energy efficiency.  I find it somewhat curious a choice, considering this is the roommate who leaves his bedroom light on when he’s not around.  Regardless, a request is a request.  Energy efficiency it is.

Naturally, I’m in favor of any kind of efficiency.  I know what you’re thinking — even the cold, efficient killing machine that was the Nazi party?  Yes, even that.  (Okay, not that.  Mass killing doesn’t exactly take a whole lot of creativity.)  But it did get me thinking about the ways that I personally try to save energy.  Mind you, my motives are to save me time and money; if it’s good for the planet, that’s no more than a nice bonus as far as I’m concerned.  Still, I think I’m doing my part.

For example, I use those curly bulbs.  My favorite thing about them is that they don’t get hot.  Go ahead, lick a curly light bulb; you’ll be fine, and they’re delicious.  It’s also nice that they last so long.  I don’t remember the last time I had to change a curly bulb for reasons that didn’t have something to do with faulty wiring.  So that’s one thing — curly bulbs mean I’m better than you incandescent bastards.

I rarely use my air conditioning; I prefer a fan and an open window until it gets over 100.  That comes less out of frugality than the fact that I’m the most comfortable person I know.  I can withstand a pretty wide range of temperatures without noticing.  I don’t sweat that much, and I have excellent circulation.  Maybe if we’d convince some of these wasteful fucks to work on their pores and veins, we wouldn’t be in such an energy crunch.

Also, just last week I painted the roof of my house white to further ease cooling costs.  Sure, I rent the place, but I can’t imagine that the landlord would be too upset.  I did get a letter from the FAA, though, saying that I’m close enough to the airport that there’s a danger of blinding incoming pilots.  I told them that I was trying to save the world, but they didn’t take too kindly to my indignation.  I guess next weekend I’ll have to bring up the turpentine, just as it’s getting hot again.  Thanks a lot, jerks.

I haven’t taken the plunge on solar power, but I do have a wind-powered anemometer out back.  All it needs is a breeze and it’ll tell you exactly how windy it is.  If it’s spinning kinda slow, it’s breezy.  If it’s going crazy, it’s hella windy.  It’s a handy tool.

What about my car, you ask?  What about it?  Because of my job, I burn gas like crazy, but I pay for it.  I haven’t siphoned gas since Carter was president, and I don’t intend to do it again.  That’s mostly because I accidentally poisoned myself the last time I tried it, but still — I’m no thief.  To save gas in general, I drive Flintstone-style when I can exclusively use surface streets.  I’m finding that’s not super efficient, though.  I’ve gone through six pairs of shoes in the last month; all that rubber and leather disintegrating on our roads can’t be great, and it’s certainly not efficient with regard to my personal energy.  I’m thinking I might abandon that plan and go back to using the pedals.  Fuck the air quality, I’m going to Schlotzky’s.

On top of all that, I also occasionally write blog posts that are half-assed at best.  A lot less energy gets expended that way.

-Darrell

I have a confession to make.  I’ve been holding onto a secret for over five years, and it’s finally time to let the cat out of the bag.  It’s been so long, I’m not sure how best to reveal the news, so I’ll just go right out and say it: in 2006, when I was living in Orange County, the roommates I told my friends about were fictional.  I did not actually befriend a handful of twenty-somethings; my roommate was Osama bin Laden.  Now that he’s gone, I feel I have to come clean.

You might ask how Osama made his way to the States to live in suburbia for over a year.  Frankly, your guess is as good as mine.  He paid his rent, and I didn’t ask questions.  Our first meeting was kind of interesting, actually.  I needed a roommate to help me rent the two-bedroom house I found in Orange, and he was the first to answer my Craigslist ad.  Of course, I recognized him immediately.  We both played it coy at first.  “I hate to tell you this, but has anyone told you that you look a lot like Osama bin Laden?”  “Yes, I get that a lot,” he said.  Then he mentioned that he had just quit his job and planned to live off the $3 billion he got from the Pakistani government, and I connected the dots.

I suppose I should have called the authorities right then and there, but I decided to take advantage of the situation myself.  I told Osama that the rent was twice what it actually was.  I’m guessing his research of the California housing market was somewhat limited because he didn’t even blink at the cost.  Sure, it was something of a dick move, but the way I looked at it at the time, he murdered thousands of my countrymen.  Tricking him into paying my rent was the least I could do for payback.

Living with Osama wasn’t as horrifying as you might expect.  As I mentioned, he paid the bills on time and in full.  He pretty much kept to himself.  In this particular house, the bedrooms were on opposite sides, each with its own bathroom (good thing, too — I had to use his bathroom a couple times in an emergency, and I tell you, he didn’t own a toilet brush).  When we did cross paths, it was usually cordial, but we didn’t have a lot in common.

What we did have in common was a love of the hookah.  I thought I was a fan, but that Osama was a dragon.  He preferred natural coals and flavorless tobacco, which made for some harsh bowls, but I eventually turned him onto the Americanized style.  It was a great way to get to know him.  While passing the hose one day, I had to ask him something that had been itching at me ever since he moved in.  “Hey Sam,” I asked, “You’re living here, watching TV, smoking my hookah… you don’t really hate America, do you?”  He said that he was still mad at America for its militaristic bent, but that living with me had softened him a bit.  “I’m a new Osama,” he said in his thick accent.

Ever since that conversation, we hung out a lot more.  He’d shave his beard and we’d go out to see movies and eat appetizers at Applebee’s.  It became our Friday tradition.  Usually, we’d see the movie first so we could talk about it as we ate.  We disagreed about them more often than not — he hated The Aristocrats, for example, but seemed to like Serenity.  I even turned him into something of a Firefly fan.  (You might have heard me say that Firefly can and should appeal to every type of person — now you know that I had evidence to back me up.) 

Every time at Applebee’s, he’d frown when I’d order a beer, but I told him something straight: you might be a teetotaler, but that doesn’t mean everyone has to be.  In the first month of living together, we had a huge fight about it.  I had left a twelve pack of Coors Light in the fridge and when he figured out what it was, the bastard threw it away!  I threatened to tear up the lease and kick him to the curb; he apologized and beyond the aforementioned grumbling, it was thenceforth a non-issue.  We had similar discussions about my atheism, my politics, etc., but he was surprisingly okay at agreeing to disagree.

The most pleasant surprise about living with Osama was how good of a cook he was.  Nobody barbecued a goat like bin Laden did.  He’d have pounds of it for the taking in the fridge; he usually ate it straight with some lentils or something, but I turned him onto putting it in tacos.  I told him that tortillas were essentially the same as pita; he gave it a try and never looked back.

It wasn’t all rosy, mind you.  No matter how much I made fun of him for it, he loved American Idol.  He’d take over the TV in the living room three times a week to watch that shit.  He even voted for his favorite singers.  I never paid attention, but I do remember how much he hated that Sanjaya guy and thought he was “an embarrassment to the show”.  At first, I thought it was just because he hated Indians, but he insisted that it had to do with his talent (or lack thereof).

I was also annoyed a bit by the girls he’d bring in.  They were all perfectly nice — quiet and visibly frightened of him, but nice.  My problem was the sheer volume of women who came through the place.  He’d have a different girl over almost every day, sometimes two or three at once, making crazy noises at all hours.  It seemed to be a rotating crew of six or seven women.  He called me a pussy for having only zero or one girlfriend at a time, and even offered to share.  I took him up on the offer only once, on a particularly lonely evening.  It didn’t go well — she just cried the whole time and begged me to fly her back home to Whateveristan.  I told her I couldn’t afford it, but I paid her cab fare; she was back with Osama within a couple weeks.  It shouldn’t surprise me that he likes a meek woman who always wants to run away, but that’s not my thing.

I know what you’re thinking.  No, I didn’t “harbor” Osama bin Laden.  I didn’t tell anyone he was with me, but I made no additional efforts to hide him (he did a good enough job of that himself).  The only aid I ever gave him was the occasional spare roll of toilet paper.  He told me he turned over a new leaf and that he’d pay for all the utilities.  That was good enough for me, so I told him that his secret was safe.

Then one day, he was gone.  His bedroom was empty; he took the bed, the automatic weapons, everything.  He made no mention about it beforehand — he had seemed a little angrier than usual over the last week or so, but I didn’t ask why.  Thankfully, the lease was to expire in just a month, so he didn’t leave me completely in the lurch.  In retrospect, perhaps I shouldn’t have trusted him.  He did orchestrate the most monstrous deed in American history, but he also looked me straight in the eye and said he had changed.  I’ll take a man at his word.  When he left, I knew that the pull of terrorism was too strong for him to ignore any longer, and I felt stupid for believing that he was done with that chapter in his life.

Now that he’s dead, I’m not sure how to feel.  Since he returned to his terrorist ways, I completely understand the need to kill him.  Public Enemy Number One and all that.  The only thing that bothers me about this whole thing is that everyone celebrating his death didn’t know the real Osama.  They didn’t tell dirty jokes with him over his homemade hummus.  They didn’t go target shooting with him in Torrance.  They didn’t have to diplomatically convince him not to eat their dog.  So while I don’t weep for his death, I hope I offend no one when I say, “Rest in peace, Sammy.”

-Darrell

Sunday night, I happened upon the premiere of HBO’s newest program, Game of Thrones.  I hadn’t planned on watching it; I was not one of the fanboys awaiting the filmed version of one of the most popular fantasy novels of his lifetime.  In fact, I never cared for fantasy.  I gave the novel Game of Thrones about twenty pages before I remembered that this was a genre not for me.  I know a handful of people who’ve read the books, so I was a little ashamed that I had trouble explaining why I didn’t care for it (beyond using words like “humorless” and “boring”, of course).  Thankfully, Sunday’s episode of Game of Thrones crystallized everything in my mind.

My biggest beef with the fantasy genre, as well as most pre-modern warfare movies, is that it glorifies the ugliest parts of humanity’s evolution.  Everything’s about “honor” and “oaths” and “proper technique when disemboweling a perceived enemy”.  Swords are treated with a reverence I never understood.  Men get their heads lopped off for no reason or, even worse, for committing an offense that we’d consider relatively minor today.  (He ran away from a horde of monsters who had just decapitated his buddy?  He’s a deserter!  Execute him!)  Plus, there’s always a handful of savages who rape and murder with abandon, as if the movie is telling us, “Gee, isn’t excessive violence upsetting?”  Yes, it is.  You and a thousand other movies have driven that point home all too well.  Now stop upsetting me.

These movies also love to remind us of how far we’ve come with respect to gender dynamics.  Back then, you see, women had no true power, marriages were arranged, and most sex was far from consensual.  Thanks, ham-handed historical fiction, I’m aware of that particular bit of ugliness, too.  Game of Thrones amped that up in the first episode, in which an absurdly gorgeous girl is forced to marry a hyper-violent troglodyte who doesn’t speak English.  Her matchmaking brother figures that if she married the leader of a powerful army, they could reclaim their kingdom that they lost somehow.  To make the point even more obvious to our modern sensibilities, the brother says, “I’d let this whole tribe fuck you if it meant getting our kingdom back.”  (Quote paraphrased slightly.)  Wow, dude.  I wonder if you’re supposed to be a bad guy.

Most scenes make me wonder how believable the producers want the show to be.  This is most obvious when I look at the women.  I understand why you cast attractive actors, but really, was every woman in this universe a pale twenty-something with C-cups?  This allows for outstanding nudity, but it doesn’t exactly help with verisimilitude to have a world that’s gray, dour, and ugly while every woman is jaw-droppingly hot.

The language also seems anachronistic.  Are they going with an older style or not?  Game of Thrones, for instance, uses phrases like “I want to fuck girls”, but also “gods be good”.  I’m not sure how long “fuck” was used colloquially as a verb, but it doesn’t feel like those particular slang terms overlapped in our language’s history.  If I’m wrong, please let me know.  In a related point, everyone seems to speak in the same indeterminate British accent, and there’s always at least one large male character who gives a phony, hearty laugh whenever he greets a friend (“HUH-HAH!”).  These are so commonplace that I never take anyone’s words seriously in these movies.  They’re just another reminder that I’m watching a movie.

I’ve covered a few of the major tropes in fantasy fiction, but some minor ones might annoy me even more.  For instance, why must everything fantasy include six dozen scenes of pointless ceremony?  The king is visiting; let’s take ten minutes to watch everyone bow.  The hero returned victorious; let’s see him get a medal pinned on him.  I hate ceremony in real life — the last thing I want is a fictional version of it slowing down an already plodding story.

This point pervades all fiction, but I’m tired of the badge of honor that fantasy fiction tends to give characters from small towns.  Royals from the big town are tactless and licentious; they’ll ask your daughter about her period, drink all your wine, and sully all your best prostitutes.  Meanwhile, anyone from the town knows how things really work.  They know about things called common sense and industriousness.  Thanks.

Needless to say, I won’t be watching episode two of Game of Thrones.  Its cinematography is fantastic, its women are gorgeous, and Peter Dinklage is always a delight, but I won’t wade through all that fantasy bullshit anymore.

Also, dragons are stupid.  Fuck dragons.

-Darrell

As far back as I can remember, me and the boys in the old neighborhood loved computers.  We took computer courses to learn as much as we could… well, we actually took the courses so we could goof off.  Early on, classmates would sadly inform each other that their characters in Oregon Trail all died of dysentery; that soon progressed to LAN sessions of Duke Nukem 3D in which classmates would curse and wish dysentery upon each other.  It was good bonding.

Throughout, it was understood among most of us that PCs were better than Macs.  They were “real” machines that did “real” computing.  They weren’t the plastic toys that filled our elementary and junior-high computer labs.  They used a mouse with more than a single button.  They had bigger, more customizable, more powerful machines that could support the best games.  A Mac is what you considered getting for your mom, but then you decided against it because it wasn’t worth explaining “compatibility”.  It was easier to tell her, “Don’t get a Mac.  You can’t switch files back and forth; just stay away.”

As you know, all that has changed.  PCs got bogged down and frustrating while Apple was busy inventing incredible gadgets that can play music, make calls, shoot video, and slingshot pudgy birds at precariously constructed towers of plywood and pigs.  As all that was happening, Apple went mainstream.  People stopped using words like “compatibility” and “upgradability” and started using words like “simple” and “reliable”.

I realize that it’s been like this for years now.  Still, I held fast to my PCs; they’re less expensive (the last real advantage for PCs) and perhaps more importantly to me, they’re familiar.  I know that programs in Windows will try to run superfluously in the background, so I know to go to Run and type “msconfig” to uncheck any services or startup programs I don’t need running.  I know that if I try to play certain games, I’d better not have run any other programs since the last reboot.  As I’ve been using it since 2001, I know Windows XP pretty well.

I think I know Windows XP as well as I know any person.  Considering my lack of computer expertise, that’s more an indictment of my interpersonal skills, but the point remains: after twenty years of fiddling with Windows, and a decade of a single version of Windows, I’ve come to realize something: I don’t think I’m in love with Microsoft anymore.  I look across the room to Bill Gates, and I see a man I had once loved.  I will always have respect for him, and I think he still has greatness ahead of him.  I just don’t see it working out between him and me.  It’s been two decades; I feel like it’s time to move on.

Am I crazy here?  Is this merely a twenty-year itch that most men should ignore (if they know what’s best for them)?  Should I continue to dance with the girl who brought me?  She’s been good to me overall, but it’s become such a drag to be with her of late, and my iPod Touch is so nifty…  Do I simply need a better PC that runs, say, Windows 7, or is that like staying with a bad girlfriend because she bought new lingerie?

Tell me what you think.  If you’re on Team Apple, what should I get and why?  Can I get something inexpensively, or are the prices fixed everywhere?  If I go laptop, will I be happy with it as my only computer?  If you’re on Team PC, please tell me why.  Remind me exactly what made me fall in love to begin with; perhaps you can rekindle the flame.  Regardless, I’m looking to purchase a new computer in the next few months, and I’d like to weave that fascinating narrative into the blog.  So comment away — I don’t care if you post it on zazzumplop, Facebook, or Twitter, but I implore you, my dozen loyal readers, to interject whatever nuggets of wisdom you can provide.  My research begins with you.

-Darrell

The other day, I got an email from the fine folks at GoDaddy.com.  It seems my multi-year lease of zazzumplop.com, the finest and easiest-to-remember domain name in the galaxy, was about to expire.  “Oh yeah,” I thought, “I have a blog that used to give me great joy.  It was my outlet to the seven people who bother to read my nonsense.  Should I renew this domain?”

That I even asked that question depressed me.  Some time ago (around the time that you might have noticed a drop-off in my frequency of posts), I allowed myself to get discouraged about the blog.  There were a variety of reasons for this, but it occurred to me not too long ago that the chief discouragement and I broke up several months ago, and that all I have to keep me from unfettered blogging is my own lingering bitterness.  Well, no more.  GoDaddy.com, take another $40 from me so you can make another dumbass commercial.  It’s time to get back on the horse.

We’ll start at a reasonable gallop.  I think that means it’s blogpodge time.

The world is turning to shit, you say?  Try to look at the big picture, buddy — life’s never been better.  (The stats are compelling, but I’d argue that the fact that they’re presented so joyfully is enough evidence that life ain’t so bad.)

Remember the Cleveland Browns?  Not the Cleveland Browns, but the Cleveland Browns — you know, the ones who turned purple and moved to Maryland.  Well, they’re responsible for a fantastic letter that you should read.

If you aren’t on Twitter, you’re missing out on a lot of free, accessible entertainment.  Notably, you can follow @zazzumplop and read my briefest musings about sports, pro wrestling, music, politics, and pro wrestling.  (Wrestling’s easy to tweet about.)  Here’s an exclusive tweet I’ll refrain from actually tweeting: “@TheRock and @JohnCena will fight a year from now at WMXXVIII?  I fear this means Rock will take an 11-month vacation.”  See what brilliance you’re missing???

Speaking of pre-determined pseudo-sporting events, here’s nearly every dunk from the NBA’s Slam Dunk Contest, starting in 1984.  You’re welcome.

Since I’m getting back on the horse, I’m a bit apprehensive about whether I’ll be able to come up with post ideas frequently enough.  I know I’d like to bitch about the NCAA, and I might have an especially blasphemous Easter post in my quiver, but beyond that, my mind is frighteningly blank.  I’ll come up with plenty, but just know that, as always, I take requests.

Let’s see, it’s April 5… are the Diamondbacks in last place yet?  NOPE — the Giants are a half-game behind us, bitches!  (Until we lose to the Cubs today… I have to brag as long as I can.)

O readers, do any of you listen to podcasts?  They’ve become my chief source of entertainment.  I have a long list of favorites that I’d be happy to share, but only if you’re interested.  I don’t want to write a thousand words about Doug Benson if I know I’ll just bore everyone.  You know what?  Fuck that.  That’s another post you can expect in the future — a comprehensive guide to the podcasts I’ve listened to.  That’ll put this blog on the map.

Hmm… several of these paragraphs are mere hype-up for future posts that don’t actually add anything or present new ideas.  If I just recap the ten previous posts I wrote, I’d be well on the way to getting a writing gig for WWE Friday Night SmackDown!

The Butler didn’t do it.  In fact, the Butler didn’t even show up at the manor on the night in question.  The Butler tried to shoot, but missed so wildly, he’s not even a suspect.  It’s apropos that Butler Bulldogs and Buffalo Bills have the same initials.  Congratulations, UConn, you deserved the championship, but it still kinda felt like you won that game by default.

Okay, toe’s in the water.  I’ll see you next week some time.  I promise.

-Darrell

For quite some time, I’ve wanted to host a trivia game show.  You know, be the American Alex Trebek, or the sane Regis Philbin.  I also have an unabiding love of the Walt Disney Corporation and all its wonderful movies.  Why not combine the two with a little bit of Disney trivia for you all?  Since my enunciation and timbre are lost in type, you’ll have to be your own hosts.  My suggestion for you is to print out this post in its entirety and host a game show of your own (just make sure the contestants aren’t regular readers of this site).  Give twenty dollars for every correct answer, a slap on the nose for every incorrect answer.  Anyway, here’s a fun list of questions that should get all Disney fans from novice to expert a chance to scratch their heads.
———
Q: How many full-length, two-dimensional, animated Disney films have one-word titles?

A: Nine (Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, Bambi, Aladdin, Pocahontas, Hercules, Mulan, and Tarzan – anyone who can name all of them gets a wet kiss from the host)
———
Q: What three Disneyland rides were inspired by non-Disney films?

A: Indiana Jones (for the Indiana Jones franchise), the Matterhorn (for Lawrence of Arabia), and Captain EO (for the movie constantly running inside Michael Jackson’s head)
———
Q: Which one of the Seven Dwarfs was racist?

A: Trick question — they all were racist.  BONUS POINTS if you can name which Dwarf’s wife hid her Puerto-Rican heritage from her husband (it was Mrs. Grumpy).
———
Q: What were the first two Disney films to be completely devoid of dialogue?

A: Fantasia and Bambi II (if anyone argues, just ask whether he/she has seen Bambi II… then move on to the next question as indignantly as possible)
———
Q: In the original version, how did the puppy-count reach 101 in 1961′s superfluously titled One Hundred and One Dalmatians?

A: While fifteen puppies were part of Pongo and Perdita’s original litter, the number shot to 101 thanks to tons of explicit neo-natal canine incest that was eventually cut from the film.  The plot was altered accordingly, having Pongo and Perdita simply “discover” 84 extra puppies at the De Vil mansion.
———
Q: What Disney character is famous for making “tick tock, tick tock…” noises?

A: The genie from Aladdin (Producers attempted to slow Robin Williams’s speech by playing a slow metronome as loudly as possible; many of the ticks remained in the final cut.)
———
Q: If one were to actually travel 20,000 leagues under the sea, how far down would one be?

A: In Hell, with that drunk Mr. Toad
———
Q: Cinderella wore glass slippers in Disney’s version; what did she wear in the original?

A: Silver spray-painted huaraches
———
Q: Where is Walt Disney buried?

A: Grant’s tomb
———
Q: In Sleeping Beauty, for how long did Sleeping Beauty sleep?

A: As long as it takes for a woodchuck to chuck wood.
———
Q: Which Disney title would make modern audiences the most uncomfortable?

A: Darby O’Gill and the Little People; PARTIAL CREDIT for Babes in Toyland and Natural Born Killers
———
Q: Which live-action Disney movie starred a donkey that kicked field goals?

A: The Garbage Picking Field Goal Kicking Philadelphia Phenomenon, starring Tony Danza
———
Q: Besides Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, what did Walt Disney cite as his greatest accomplishment?

A: His mustache
———
Q: Who was Dick van Dyke’s voice coach in Mary Poppins?

A: Voice coach?  That’s all him, baby.
———
Q: What was the first full-length, animated Disney feature to feature a non-white protagonist?

A: Pinocchio (while flesh in color, Pinocchio was made of wood)
———
Q: What was the original title of 1965′s That Darn Cat!?

A: God Damn That Motherfucking Cunt of a Cat!  (In one of his last decisions, Walt Disney himself ordered that the title be changed because “cunt don’t sell outside Tijuana”.)
———
Q: What was the first song from a Disney movie to win an Oscar?

A: “The Bobsledders’ Cry” from Cool Runnings
———
Q: Which Disney princess was later stripped of her title?

A: Pocahontas (if you don’t know why, figure it out)
———
FINAL DISNEOPARDY: You may wager some, none, or all of your winnings up to this point on the following question: The American Film Institute voted that what was the most violent animated Disney movie?

A: Robin Hood, for its “blatant depiction of the consequences of archery”
———

I hope you enjoyed the game.  I don’t know who ended up with the most points in your game, but I guarantee that everyone came out a winner.

-Darrell

The calendar flips another page, and another tradition must be fulfilled.  That’s right, it’s time for the Year in Review.

I realize that this is the tardiest Year in Review in the blog’s history.  I swear, I have several awesome excuses that involve friends crossing oceans to see me as well as trips to Vegas, Colorado, and Funkytown.  It’s been a busy new year.  Thankfully, now my life is much more boring, so I have the time to inform you about everything that happened, month by month, in the grand year of Twenty-Ten.  As always, what follows is the pure, unadulterated news and is exactly how I remember it.

—————

JANUARY

Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, opens to the public in Dubai.  Not to be outdone, Donald Trump hoists a 2,500-foot lightning rod atop Trump Tower in New York.  Informed that such an upgrade would not be recognized in tallest-building designations, Trump unsuccessfully attempts to purchase Burj Khalifa for less than 1% its reported value.

Talk-show host Conan O’Brien announces that he is leaving NBC’s Tonight Show after only seven months at the position.  His departure comes after fierce protests by interest groups who complained that NBC’s late-night lineup was not “bland” or “predictable” enough, and thus forced them to lose valuable sleep.

In another victory for predictable entertainment, James Camaeron’s Avatar becomes the highest-grossing film of all time.  In a press release, Cameron announces that he will spend the film’s earnings on research dedicated to searching and mining for unobtainium.

Haiti is rocked by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake, killing over 300,000 people and causing over $200 in damage.

Acclaimed author and noted hermit J.D. Salinger dies at the age of 91 after falling from a cliff during a jog through a field of rye.  Salinger’s family is suing the owner of the field because its hired “catcher” should have been on duty at the time.

FEBRUARY

The New Orleans Saints defeat the Indianapolis Colts to win Super Bowl XLIV.  When asked what he would do next, Super Bowl MVP Drew Brees responds, “I’m going to… New Orleans!  I’m getting free daquiris for life!”

The XXI Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver begin tragically when Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili is killed during a practice session, creating an uproar over the safety of the luge course.  The biggest problem, experts say, was the track’s placement directly beside the biathlon course, whose stray bullets were responsible for Kumaritashvili’s death.

Element 112 is officially named Copernicium and assigned the symbol Cn by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry.  The name change is in tribute to the astronomer Copernicus, who donated $20 million to the IUPAC for naming rights.

Toyota president Akio Toyoda apologizes to Congress for the previous year’s difficulties with the accelerators on Camrys and Priuses.  In the apology, Toyoda also apologizes for his company’s continued use of Way-Too-Excited-About-Toyotas Guy in its television advertisements.

Moammar Qadaffi declares a holy war on Switzerland after the landlocked country’s largest chocolatier announced that they would no longer offer a curry-flavored dark chocolate as part of its holiday sampler.

MARCH

A volcano in Iceland causes delays and cancellations of European air travel for months when it erupts its name, Eyjafjallajokull, across Europe.  Notably not annoyed by the eruption are European Scrabble players, who report an average 30-point improvement due to the extra letters available.

The Italian space program announces that it will put a man on Mars within two weeks.  After the two weeks pass, Italian president Silvio Berlusconi cites “sexual distraction” as a result of the failure.  He later announces the abandonment of all such plans for space travel.

President Obama makes his first trip to Afghanistan and meets with Afghani President Hamid Karzai.  At the meeting, Obama repeatedly attempts to discuss the war, but the conversation repeatedly devolves into a discussion of Hannah Montana, Karzai’s favorite American television program.

APRIL

Apple releases its newest gadget, the iPad, to the public.  When explained to the nation’s old people as “like an iPhone, but bigger”, thousands of Apple Store employees are forced to squeegee ear-print stains from their floor models.

Justice John Paul Stevens retires after 34 years of service on the Supreme Court.  In a press release, Stevens stated that he wanted to devote his time training to become an MMA fighter, and is expected to square off with Junior Dos Santos some time in the spring of 2011.

In response to threats posted by a radical Muslim website, Comedy Central pulls the scheduled airing of a South Park episode that ridicules Muhammad Ali for losing to Joe Frazier.

The state of Arizona passes the controversial S.B. 1070, a bill that requires all brownish people to carry and present proof of American citizenship whenever asked by a judge, law enforcement officer, or Applebee’s server.

MAY

A car bomb is detected in New York City’s Times Square before it is detonated.  The car aroused suspicion when locals noticed that it was parked legally.

Politician Goodluck Jonathan is sworn in as President of Nigeria.  He rises to the post due to the death of Nigeria’s previous president, Hardluck Albert.

Fox series 24 airs its last episode.  Mere days after the final taping, a bored Kiefer Sutherland is seen electrocuting a Muslim priest with a car battery.

After a fall at his house, actor Gary Coleman dies at the age of 42.  At Coleman’s funeral, an addled Todd Bridges is seen wielding a sword and referring to himself as the Highlander.

JUNE

Former Vice President Al Gore announces that he and his wife, Tipper, are divorcing.  According to the divorce papers, the primary reason for the divorce was Mr. Gore’s refusal to remove his Nobel Peace Prize during sex.

McDonald’s recalls 12 million glasses themed for the seventeenth Shrek film after it is discovered that seeing the mere image of the animated ogre caused nausea and rectal swelling in over half of McDonald’s customers.

The University of Colorado’s athletic department announces that it will join the Pac-10 conference in all sports.  This begins a major shake-up of college football alignment, resulting in the Big Ten having twelve teams, the Big 12 having ten teams, the Pac-10 changing its name to the Pac-12, and the Big East changing its name to the Mediocre Nine.

An underwater oil pipe in the Gulf of Mexico gushes for months, causing an incalculable amount of damage to the water and its indigenous species.  Dozens of attempts to stop the leak are unsuccessful until actor Kevin Costner stops the leak by stuffing it with unsold DVDs of Waterworld and For Love of the Game.

General Stanley McChrystal is relieved of his duties as top U.S. Commander in Afghanistan after telling Rolling Stone magazine that President Barack Obama has “a shaky plan” for the region as well as “a terrible jump shot”.

JULY

An octopus named Paul correctly predicts the result of every elimination game in the World Cup, including Spain’s victory over Holland in the final.  Paul’s final prediction comes a week after the World Cup, when he swam toward the “YES” box when asked, “Will Paul the Octopus be delicious?”

In a live, hour-long ESPN production entitled “The Decision”, NBA star LeBron James announces that he will play the following season for the Miami Heat, and that he will use his contract money to bulldoze the entire city of Cleveland.

Audio tapes are released that allegedly show an enraged Mel Gibson berating his live-in girlfriend.  Most disturbing is when Gibson threatens to kill her for not enjoying Apocalypto.

Over three million bottles of Tylenol, Benadryl, and Motrin are recalled by Johnson & Johnson due to a manufacturing error that made the pills smell like bacon.  When told that such an error would be more delightful than troubling, Johnson & Johnson attempts to recall the recall until Jewish interest groups convince them to recall the recall of the recall.

AUGUST

Musician Wyclef Jean announces plans to run for President of Haiti, but is quickly informed that he is ineligible because he exceeded the maximum-income requirement.

A team of investors led by Hall-of-Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan purchases the Texas Rangers.  As a result, the team quickly wins two postseason series and seven bench-clearing brawls.

The World Sauna Championships held in Heinola, Finland, are cancelled forever after the death of participant Vladimir Ladyzhenskiy, who shot himself after realizing that this was Finland’s most prestigious sporting event.

SEPTEMBER

Classified-ad website craigslist.com closes its Adult Services section, following allegations that it encouraged prostitution and sexual predators.  Somewhat shockingly, no such allegations have been raised regarding vatican.va’s Meet A Priest section.

Controversy arises surrounding the proposed construction of a mosque and Islamic center mere blocks away from Ground Zero.  Loudest among the critics were local New Yorkers, who wished to maintain the city’s simple, pastoral, ethnically homogenous culture.

NFL running back Reggie Bush gives the Heisman Trophy he won while playing for USC back to the New York Athletic Club.  According to Bush, his reasons for returning the trophy stemmed from the fact that the New York Athletic Club had improperly used funds to pay for players’ flights, meals, and lodging during the weekend of the award ceremony.  When asked by reporters, fellow Heisman winner Tim Tebow stated that he had “no plans” to return his trophy.

OCTOBER

Chilean miners who had been trapped underground for 69 days are freed.  The event airs on live television, showing the celebration after the extraction of every one of the 33 miners.  The celebration is more muted when rescuers extracted the 75 buckets of excrement that the miners had filled.

Political analyst Juan Williams is fired from his job on Fox News on the grounds that his experience with NPR trained him to speak at a volume that was “far too reasonable” to be appropriate for the cable news channel.  In response, NPR softly whispered mild criticisms about Fox News president Roger Ailes, but none of NPR’s listeners were awake to hear them.

Boston Red Sox owner John Henry expands his sports-team ownership when he purchases Liverpool FC of the English Premier League.  When asked of his interest in the club, Henry replied that he wished to hear how Bostonians would pronounce “Livahpool”.

Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Roy Halladay pitches the first postseason no-hitter since 1956 in their first Divisional Series game against the Cincinnati Reds.  Initial praise turned to derision when investigators learn that a ratings-desperate Bud Selig had replaced all of Cincinnati’s wooden bats with ones made from soft rubber.

Chinese dissident Liu Xiabao wins the Nobel Peace Prize.  The Chinese government expectedly condemns the award, saying that what happens in Liu’s prison cell is far from peaceful.

NOVEMBER

WikiLeaks, a public-information website, releases hundreds of previously secret diplomatic cables, including one that shows Secretary of State Hillary Clinton giving orders to spy on ambassadors to the United Nations.  Rather than address this violation of the Geneva Convention, the governments of Sweden and the United States are forced to arrest WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange under the international “Shoot the Messenger” accord.

Delaware Senate nominee Christine O’Donnell makes headlines when it is revealed that the current Christian had dabbled in witchcraft as a youth.  To explain herself, O’Donnell announces that her previous beliefs in supersition and lies were replaced by a much clearer belief in lies and superstition.

Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski makes history by winning her reelection as a write-in candidate.  The news comes as great shock to the other 49 states, who were surprised to learn that Alaskans could spell.

DECEMBER

New York Congressman Charles Rangel is officially censured for violating House ethics rules.  Chief among the violations are his improper rental of rent-stabilized apartments and his apparent lack of marital infidelity.

After enduring a massive earthquake and having its hopes dashed by Wyclef Jean, Haiti suffers through a cholera outbreak that kills over 3,000.  Later, representatives from the Dominican Republic are seen attempting to saw Haiti off the island of Hispaniola, just as Bugs Bunny did to Florida in 1949.

—————

Well, that’s everything that happened in 2010.  Not a lot of good news this time around.  Not even the Finnish sauna championships went well.  Maybe we’ll have better luck with a year that has two ones and one two (…and a zero).

-Darrell

The title says it all, but I’ll say it again: TRON didn’t make any goddamned sense to me.

This isn’t a review; if you’re interested in seeing TRON: Legacy, you probably already saw it.  If you’re not interested in seeing it… you probably have good instincts.  So no review — just a few questions that perhaps the supernerds out in the aether might be able to address.

First off, what are the fucking rules of combat?  Usually, if a flying disc thingy hits a person (oh sorry, “program”), that person disintegrates into a billion pixels.  But near the end, Olivia Wilde got hit in the arm, and it only disintegrated her arm.  Naturally, this forced Jeff Bridges and the Lukewarm Protagonist to do some heavy concentrating on her arm so it could regenerate… or something.  Ignoring that transparent plot convenience, exactly what injures and what kills?

When people disintegrate into a billion pixels, do they die?  Were they ever truly alive in the first place?  I don’t mean to ask for philosophical hokum in a movie already overflowing with it, but it would help to know what the stakes were.  Are these characters risking their lives or not?

Why must the rules of combat be so arbitrary?  Sometimes it’s a deathmatch on light-cycles, sometimes it’s hand-to-hand, sometimes the deck is stacked against the Lukewarm Protagonist, sometimes it isn’t.  Regardless, most scenes left me confused as to what exactly happened.  Wait, did that guy just win?  Did we want him to win?  Who are all those other guys?  Why did a helmet spontaneously appear on the Lukewarm Protagonist’s head?  Why did it just disappear?  Why does Cartoon Jeff Bridges always wear a helmet during combat, but the Lukewarm Protagonist does only sometimes?

Why have a Cartoon Jeff Bridges anyway?  I guess he’s a program created by Actual Jeff Bridges in the video-game world, and thus is unable to age.  Fine.  The real question is, why did the director choose to convey this with a creepy cartoon version of Jeff Bridges?  Why not just have the real Jeff Bridges bathe in Oil of Olay and dye his hair?  We can fill in those inconsistencies a lot more readily than a CGI version of Jeff Bridges that owns a very large property in the Uncanny Valley.

Why should I care about Jeff Bridges’ utopian society?  It doesn’t look anything like a utopia.  All people do is ride around a grid and occasionally murder each other.  There’s never any evidence of bits and bytes living happily together, making pixelated roasts in their virtual ovens.  I don’t think they even count as people — they’re just humanoid representations of computer programs.  I don’t see the application to real life, or why Jeff Bridges was okay with staying in there for so long.  I was hoping he’d be a madman, the only human in a computer program for thirty years, decorating the virtual grid with his virtual feces.  That would make more sense to me than Jeff Bridges creating a utopia for nobody in particular.

Finally, when will 3-D look like actual 3-D instead of a moving View-Master?  I suspect that day won’t come for some time — until it does, can we all just agree to stick with two dimensions for the sake of our eyeballs and wallets?

-Darrell

Hello, loyal readers.  It is time again to write an impromptu story.  I shall write a short story based on suggestions I received through Facebook.  (Submission period is currently closed.)  I’ve put the suggestions on slips of paper and randomly drawn a location, occupation, and famous person on which to base the story.  Depending on how it goes, I might do it again later in the week.  The first winners of the drawing are Disneyland, furniture tester, and the Fonz.  Hmm.  Well, let’s see how this goes.

————

“Come on, Fonz, don’t be a drag,” said an impatient Ralph Malph.  “Let’s hightail it to the Matterhorn!”

“Yeah, Fonz, let’s check out Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.  I hear that it’s wild!”  Potsie added helpfully.

“Have a little respect.  Honest Abe was our greatest president, and we won’t do anything here until we give him that respect.  Respect.  It’s important.”

The Fonz has long been a proponent of showing proper deference to those deserving, but he recently developed a more somber attitude.  Two months prior, Fonzie promised to take his newly adopted son, Danny, to Disneyland.  Danny told him that at the orphanage, he would lie to the other kids about going to Disneyland with his parents.  You know, before they died.  Softie that he is, Arthur Fonzarelli promised then and there that he would take him to the Happiest Place on Earth.  After all, he wanted the happiest son on Earth.

They had every detail planned out: ride from Milwaukee to Anaheim with Danny in the sidecar all day Tuesday; arrive at the Disney gates an hour before they open, just to add to the anticipation; enter the gates and have the greatest father-son day they could ever imagine.  Sadly, a mere week before their scheduled departure, Danny was hit by a speeding Ford Thunderbird as he chased after a ball that had bounced into the street.  He was killed instantly.

Fonzie never stopped blaming himself.  “I never should have bought that house on Dead Man’s Curve.  I should have known!”

“You can’t blame yourself,” Richie would tell him.  “Accidents happen.  Remember when Chachi accidentally burned down Arnold’s?  We forgave him for that.”

Fonzie stared forward, eyes glassy.  “Arnold’s was rebuilt.  I had lunch there today.  Can you rebuild my son?”

“Gee whiz,” Potsie responded.  “This is too heavy for me.  I know what you need — we’re taking you to Disneyland!”  The gang emitted a simultaneous “Yeah!”

“I don’t know guys,” Fonzie protested, “that sounds like a terrible idea.”  After much prodding from Ralph, Potsie, and Richie, the Fonz finally relented, and they all piled into Mr. C’s blue DeSoto.

The Fonz didn’t say much during the drive to California.  Every landmark, wheat field, and mountain was another sight that Danny was missing.  The gang tried its best to keep things light by pointing out pretty girls or entering impromptu drag races.  By Missouri, though, they all realized that nothing could cheer him up.  Still, they held out hope that perhaps Walt Disney had a little magic for him.

At the Happiest Parking Lot on Earth, Fonzie reluctantly stepped out of the car and walked toward the gates.  Without a word, he looked to the right and took a beeline toward the marquee that read “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln”.  Besides Eisenhower, Lincoln was the Fonz’s favorite president.  He considered a talking, robotic Lincoln a fitting and educational beginning to a day of fun with his son.  Ralph and Potsie, in all their insensitive impatience, disagreed.  “Don’t be a drag,” they said.  “There are rides and candy,” they said.  Fonzie had had enough; he was seeing Lincoln whether they wanted to join him or not.

Ralph, Potsie, Richie, and Fonzie found their seats in the theater.  Ralph, in a lousy mood, complained about the quality of his chair.  “I know a good chair when I see one — I worked as a furniture tester part-time for three years!  This is not made for a lot of use.  I mean, look at the upholstery — it’s cracking already!  How long has this theatre been here?” 

As impatient as the others, Richie piped up, “Hey Ralph, you know what you can do with that chair?”

“What’s that, Rich?”

“Sit on it!”

“That’s the thing, though, I really can’t because it–” Ralph cut himself off, finally realizing Richie’s intent.  “Ohhh, okay.  I’ll stop talking.”

The curtains raised and there he was: our sixteenth president, Abraham Lincoln.  The Fonz sat upright.  He was in the presence of greatness.

“The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty,” the President began, and Fonzie was transfixed.  He thought about how hard Lincoln had it, and how he saved the Union in spite of it all.  He didn’t let a civil war bring him down.  Not even the deaths of two of his young children kept him from doing what was right.

As Fonzie’s heart swelled, the robotic Lincoln began to stutter.  “Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which, spirit which, spirit which…”

“What’s going on?” Potsie whispered.  “This isn’t part of Lincoln’s speech, is it?”

“Fonz, you gotta do something!”

Nervously, Fonzie popped up and ran toward the stage.  He knew what he had to do; he had done it a thousand times before, but for the first time, he wasn’t sure if he could.  He was afraid that he had lost his confidence — that there was just too much hurt inside him.

“Come on, Fonz, you can do it!” Potsie exhorted, tears in his eyes.

As Fonzie saw his three friends encouraging him among the confused crowd, he took a deep breath, hopped onto the stage, formed a fist, and rapped the President on the back.

“…spirit which, spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands everywhere.”  The crowd whooped and hollered in such loud appreciation, nobody could hear the rest of Lincoln’s speech.  Potsie sobbed, “He’s back!  He’s finally back!”

The four walked out of the theater afraid to say anything, lest they ruin the moment.  Finally, Ralph broke the silence.  “So… who wants a malt?  I’m buying.”

“You go on ahead,” said Fonzie with a slight smile.  “Cinderella just caught my eye.”

————
-Darrell

Hello all.  This evening I have several things to write, none of which are related.  I guess that means it’s blogpodge time.  Let’s begin.

I’ll begin with a video game recommendation.  If you haven’t played Portal, you’re missing out.  I don’t care whether you’re a hardcore or a casual gamer, this is a humorous platform/puzzler that everyone must play.  I’m not even all the way through it and I’m obsessed.  It forces you to look at the world around you in new, disorienting ways, and also requires a certain amount of dexterity.  It’s available for $20 on Steam, and has been released on Xbox and PlayStation.  With that price and availability, you can’t afford not to play.

Did you see this clip from Wheel of Fortune?  Yes, it’s impressive that she knew the puzzle so quickly.  I can’t help but consider, though, that it was bad strategy.  Knowing the puzzle, she should have maximized her cash.  There were three Gs and three Ts that would have netted her more money.  I guess $5800 toward your total (thanks to the prize) is nothing to sneeze at, but you’d have to be super-paranoid about spinning Bankrupt not to want to squeeze at least a few more letters out of the puzzle.  Full disclosure: she ended up winning the game, so my point is completely moot.

Overheard at a bar: “I’ve had ringworm more times than I have fingers and impetigo more times than I have fingers and toes.”  Come on, man, I’m drinking here!  I feel like I should note that “impetigo” was mispronounced in the common “infant-tie-go” form.

Teaching geometry tonight made me realize that it’s my favorite math subject to teach.  This is because it lets me draw shapes on the board, and man oh man am I fantastic at it.  I like that I can make a nearly perfect circle inscribed in a nearly perfect square.  It reminds me of my childhood when I would draw logos for sports (mostly NBA) teams.  Since I lacked actual artistic skills, my favorites were the simpler, geometric logos.  I still can do convincing renditions of the ’90s logos for the Suns, Jazz, and Pacers.  I never mastered the Timberwolves, Celtics, or Bucks for obvious reasons.

Musical stand-up comic recommendation: Bo Burnham.  He’s 20 years old in this Comedy Central special, and he’s uniquely funny.  I think you’ll enjoy him.  (If you explore his YouTube backlog, it’s a lot less polished, so be warned.)

Via tweet from Joe: contradictions in the Bible.  It combines two of my favorite things: religious debunking and graphs.

I’ve come to realize that In-N-Out Burger gives me the most consistently enjoyable poops.

Speaking of burgers (and poops, I suppose), there’s a newish burger place on Mill called Five Guys.  It’s a chain that recently made its way to Arizona.  According to the dozens of large-print signs on the walls, they’ve received a great deal of acclaim from various publications.  Anecdotally, I’ve heard nothing but good things about it.  Well, let me end the streak.  They don’t make a bad burger, per se, but it’s uninteresting and — worst of all — overpriced.  For four fewer dollars I can get a superior burger from the aforementioned In-N-Out.  If you’re more in the mood for pseudo-gourmet, Lobby’s is better and also cheaper.  Maybe I’m just turned off by their blatant autofellatio, but Five Guys ain’t as hot as they say.

I’ll catch you all later in the week with new and exciting things.  Perhaps I’ll try another impromptu short story — the last one seemed to work out okay.  I must now play Portal.

-Darrell

There’s some pointless news in the basketball world going around.  According to Detroit Piston Charlie Villanueva, Boston Celtic Kevin Garnett called him a “cancer patient” as part of an in-game taunt.  Villanueva suffers from alopecia, which means he’s completely hairless.  Garnett insisted that he was misheard, saying that Villanueva was “cancerous to [his] team and the league” and that he never actually used cancer in such a light.  He followed it up with the part of this story that angers me most: “I would never be insensitive to the brave struggle cancer patients endure.”  Ugh.  I hate athletes’ warmed-over apologies and backtracks, but I really hate that our culture forces them in the first place.

The faux-outrage from sports-columnist blowhards has been completely backward.  Let’s just say that Garnett actually called the hairless Piston a cancer patient.  In that statement, Garnett directly insulted someone while vaguely making light of the fact that people with cancer tend to lose their hair.  Shouldn’t we be more upset about the personal insult?  And wasn’t the “corrected” version even worse?  I consider it far more uncouth to say “you’re cancerous to your team” than it is to be distasteful about people who aren’t even in earshot.

Okay, “personal insult” is an overstatement.  It’s just trash talk, and the only reason we’re even talking about it is because Villanueva posted it on Twitter.  His tweeting a competitor’s trash talk felt like a sensitive child crying to his mother about being called a doodyhead.

Seriously, though, what’s so horrible about calling a bald man a cancer patient?  It’s not funny or clever, but I don’t see the evil in it.  I have no problem with making light of cancer — we must make light of horrible things.  Otherwise, life is nothing but a parade of bleakness and suffering.  Is it that Garnett used the subject to be mean?  As I mentioned, it’s just trash talk.  If trash talk were serious, all of our mothers would be too busy smoking crack and sucking dick to raise us.  Besides, we already knew that Garnett was a hyper-competitive asshole.  Upsetting competitors is his M.O.  If that’s what bothers you, then I agree — Kevin Garnett (and the entire NBA) should act more gentlemanly.  But don’t be mad because a seven-footer didn’t give people with cancer the proper solemn respect.  Those affected by cancer (i.e., all humans) have better things to worry about and, therefore, should get the fuck over it.

If any of this offended you, then I hope you get polio.

-Darrell

Dirk Branson hasn’t paid taxes on his mansion in five years.  Dirk Branson wasted taxpayer dollars as a state Senator by voting in favor of Obama’s failed stimulus bill.  And you want him to be your Attorney General?

In 2005, he was quoted in the Senate chambers telling a colleague, “I don’t see why this stimulus won’t work.”  Looks like Dirk Branson doesn’t have the economic know-how to be our chief litigator.  No thanks, Dirk.

Dirk Branson has a lot of explaining to do.  While regional manager of a chain of Hardee’s restaurants, Dirk Branson received ten complaints from female employees regarding “inappropriate comments”, two of which resulted in disciplinary measures.  One complaint stated, “he touched my butt.”  Don’t let Dirk Branson touch your butt.  On November 2, elect Todd Snodgrass as your next Attorney General.

“Everybody loves a good time…”  “I got two [women] in there waiting just for me…”  “I’ll give you fifty bucks to take that off…”  Are these the words of Missouri’s next Attorney General?  Only if Dirk Branson has his way.  Dirk Branson: bad for women.  Bad for Missouri.

Dirk Branson says he loves Missouri.  He’s a man of the people.  Why is it, then, that he was spotted wearing a New York baseball cap in a driveway press conference?  Does Missouri need a New Yorker making its decisions?  It’s time for a true Missouran.  It’s time for Todd Snodgrass.

August 23, 1974, Todd Snodgrass received the Purple Heart after being wounded in a firefight in Vietnam.  That same day, Dirk Branson placed third in a competitive yacht race off the coast of Chile.  Which man would you rather have working for us?

During his term as state Senator, Dirk Branson voted on the same side as disgraced Senator Phil Parker 87% of the time.  We don’t need any more Phil Parkers in our Senate.  Elect Todd Snodgrass.

Dirk Branson authored a “limited amnesty” bill for drug offenders, freeing over 2500 convicted criminals.  One of those criminals was James Juarez, who was later convicted of armed robbery and possession of an illegal firearm.  Dirk Branson endangers the public.

What sort of man is Dirk Branson?  Branson managed eight Hardee’s restaurants, all of which went out of business within two years, putting over 200 people out of work.  Meanwhile, Dirk Branson was busy writing “erotic fiction” for a pornographic magazine.  Does Missouri deserve a smut king who runs businesses into the ground?  Vote for Todd Snodgrass on Tuesday.

A man of the law should act in strict accordance with it.  Why is it, then, that a man who wants to be Attorney General was arrested at the age of nineteen for underage drinking and public urination?  He’s soiled Missouri’s streets — don’t let him soil our government.

“Dirk Branson raped me.”  So says a former Hardee’s employee who worked for Dirk Branson.  “We were in the freezer… I was really scared…”  Dirk Branson was never charged.  How did he escape justice?  Ask Judge Thomas Yeager, seen most recently driving a new BMW.  Connect the dots, Missouri.

Branson has made a habit of opposing minority rights.  He has earned a 17% rating from the NAACP and a 0% from the National Organization for Women.  Dirk Branson is out of touch.  Missouri is too smart to elect a racist, sexist rapist.

Dirk Branson murdered his own grandmother.  After a stroke that doctors said was “survivable”, Dirk Branson elected to take his 92-year-old grandmother off life support.  It should come as no surprise, then, that the AARP endorsed Todd Snodgrass for Attorney General.  Dirk Branson: he will kill your grandmother.

It seems Dirk Branson’s biggest enemy is the tape recorder.  Between takes of his recent political ad, Branson’s voice is caught saying, “It was delicious.”  What was so delicious?  “In Korea, I had some dog soup.  I gotta say, it was delicious.”  “It was delicious.”  “[Dog] was delicious.”  Does Missouri want an Attorney General who considers dogs “delicious”?  Vote Todd Snodgrass.

Dirk Branson says that former Marine Todd Snodgrass is “a liar and a jerk”.  Name-calling again, Dirk?  Missouri deserves someone with a cooler head.  Missouri deserves Todd Snodgrass.

Vote for Todd Snodgrass today.

-Darrell

I have excellent news for my cinephile readers.  I have come upon a device that allows me to travel into the future.  It’s not a perfect time machine, as it can take me as far as two months into the future for three hours at a time.  It’s kind of a shitty time machine, come to think of it.  But rather than bemoan such limited powers, I have decided to use the power for good — I shall see upcoming movies and let you know whether they’re worth seeing.  I took several trips into the recent future and what follows are my reviews.

THE AMERICAN — The story is that George Clooney is an American.  There’s also quite a bit of intrigue.  In one scene, he’s in line for donuts when some asshole cuts in front of him.  Clooney gives him a thorough dressing down and the man apologizes, saying that he didn’t see the line.  That’s when our boy George gives the acting performance of his life — he exasperatedly gestures to the dozen people obviously queuing in front of the register and gives an exhale that is both understated and overblown.  A masterful performance.  Two stars.

GOING THE DISTANCE — It’s a romantic comedy with Warren Cheswick and the girl from E.T..  The best part is when it looks like their relationship isn’t going to make it.  Then they realize they were made for each other and that they could survive any turmoil as long as they communicate.  Kudos to the actors who played the friends of the main characters for offering such excellent comic relief.  Two stars.

RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE 3D — I think that’s how the title of the movie went.  It was those elements put in some order.  I must say, I’m still a little queasy from all the three-dimensional brain spatter.  In this movie, Milla Jovovich has to prolong the life of a dying world for another day.  Infected zombies rule the planet and… okay, I have to be honest.  I slept through most of this one.  I think I remember one scene in which Jovovich was searching for some sort of vaccine, but the room that had the vaccine was totally filled with brain-hungry zombies.  Using weapons that wouldn’t work in real life, she dispatched of all of them by the time I drifted off for a second time.  Two stars (for what I saw).

LEGENDARY — That’s right, John Cena has another movie.  What sets this apart from his other WWF-produced dude-schlock is that this movie is actually about wrestling.  Sort of.  Cena’s a convicted felon and has a younger brother who looks nothing like him and is less than half his size.  Since John Cena is his big brother, the kid dreams of becoming a mediocre high-school wrestler.  Cena goes out of his comfort zone to play not just a wrestler, but a reluctant and angry wrestling coach.  The film goes off the rails by the third reel, unfortunately, as the script goes overboard with Cena’s coaching powers.  Just after the climax, the 110-pound fifteen-year-old is able to subdue, pin, and disembowel a mugger played by Michael Clarke Duncan.  Frankly, it took me out of the movie.  Two stars.

WALL STREET 2: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS — It’s been said, but Jesus tap-dancing Christ, that’s a terrible title.  Money never sleeps?  It also never wakes up or eats breakfast.  It’s money.  Anyway, Michael Douglas reprises his role from Wall Street, which I think was made in the ’80s.  Or maybe Michael Douglas is reprising Kirk Douglas’s role from the original movie that was made in the ’60s.  Either way, the movie gave me as confused a look as Shia LaBeouf had through most of the movie.  “What’s that, father-in-law former Wall Street bigwig Gordon Gekko?  I get a private jet?  Why?  Okay, thanks.”  “What’s that, screenwriter?  Money can turn people into assholes if they aren’t careful?  Why?  Okay, thanks.”  Two stars.

HOWL — James Franco plays Allen Ginsberg in what I thought was going to be a biopic about the poet.  Instead, it was another James Franco meta-joke.  It was ninety minutes of Franco wearing a goofy wig and reading Ginsberg’s poetry aloud to an increasingly impatient day care.  Going on General Hospital was one thing, but wasting my precious time-travel time took it too far.  Two stars.

THE SOCIAL NETWORK — It’s a movie about Facebook.  It’s real.  I promise.  They’re making a movie about Facebook.  But don’t worry; it’s about the founders of Facebook, not the social networking site itself.  At least that’s what I think it was about.  I took the same strategy with the movie that I take with Facebook — as most of the theatre watched the movie without realizing that four hours had passed, I sat down for five minutes, got bored, left, then came back the next day to see if anything changed.  It didn’t.  Two stars.

IT’S KIND OF A FUNNY STORY — Kind of.  Two stars.

SECRETARIAT — Diane Lane plays the owner of Secretariat in this “Based on a True Story” picture.  It’s a heartwarming tale that really teaches you a lot about the inner workings of horse racing.  Unfortunately, I think Diane Lane has it in her contract that she must be portrayed as impossibly sexy in every film.  The resulting romance between Lane and the legendary horse provided Lane’s most uncomfortable love scene since Nights in Rodanthe.  Two stars.

JACKASS 3-D — Holy.  Shit.  I never thought I’d have so much fun seeing a grown man get circumcised by a crocodile.  The fact that it was in 3-D made it even better.  If you’re a man who likes watching other men hurt themselves and laugh at each other about it, this is your Citizen Kane.  I don’t care if I’ve already seen it; I’m going opening night, and you’re coming with me.  Four stars.

-Darrell

I have an announcement.  Yesterday afternoon, doctors diagnosed me with NFL fever.  They say the only prescription is to make wild predictions about the upcoming professional football season for all eight divisions.  That’s right — thirty-two teams’ worth of empty pontificating.  Don’t worry, non-sports fans, most of this will be false and ridiculous anyway, so you can enjoy these analyses without knowing what a “slot receiver” is (hint: it involves prostitution).  Let’s begin in my backyard and move outward.

NFC WEST
The Cardinals’ biggest question is whether Matt Leinart will mature enough to stop acting like he’s still in college and go back to playing like he did… in college.  Speaking of USC, Pete Carroll took over for the Seahawks; he plans to continue his winning ways by making sure that all his players are paid in secret.  The Rams have been terrible of late, but many are optimistic that Sam Bradford can lead them to the promised land of a four-win season.  The 49ers look to be the biggest threat to the Nals’ streak, but only if their players manage to survive their own training camp.  My prediction: Cardinals win the division at 9-7, and Leinart will get credit only from the most casual of fans.

AFC WEST
The Chargers ran away with the division last year, mostly because the Broncos forgot how to play football after their bye week.  Expect what’s-his-name… Josh Matthews!  That guy — expect him to have his players prepared.  Because otherwise, um, they won’t be prepared.  (Side note for broadcasters of Broncos games: his name is Knowshon Moreno — more-RAY-no.  His name is not pronounced like Dan Marino’s.  Get it right.)  Raider Nation is abuzz about the addition of Jason Campbell, which is interesting, since the Redskins are abuzz about the subtraction of Jason Campbell.  The Chiefs are in this division, too.  I actually think they’re due to overachieve for once.  Still, it’s the Chargers’ division.  I’ll conservatively give them 17 wins this season, which would be a record in a 16-game season (final record: seventeen and negative one).

NFC NORTH
In Hell this year, I’m told that the Super Bowl will be Vikings vs. Broncos with Brett Favre and Tim Tebow starting.  The only thing keeping it from happening is Favre’s ankle and Orton’s talent… and the fact that the Packers are a better team.  Now I can breathe easier.  Also, Bears and Lions!  The only plus for the Bears is that their receivers are named Johnny Knox (so we all can call him Jackass) and Devin Aromashodu (which is almost as fun to say as TJ Houshmandzadeh).  As for the Lions, they get to play on Thanksgiving.  Like always.  Prediction: Packers take it at 12-4.

AFC NORTH
Everybody’s high on the Ravens, presumably because they added another killer to their roster in Donte’ Stallworth.  (Non-football fans: I mean that literally.  Baltimore now has at least two players who have killed people.  Fun fact, right?)  Unfortunately, that swagger will be offset by the super-talented but unfortunately non-felonious Anquan Boldin.  He’ll play outstandingly, but he’s too nice of a guy to win the AFC North.  Nope, what a team needs to win the North is as many crazy assholes as possible.  The Steelers are trying their best to win that competition by keeping sleazeball Ben Roethlisberger on the team, but I don’t think it’s enough.  Same goes for the Browns, who have stepped backwards by signing a washed-up (and, by all accounts, nice) Jake Delhomme.  That leaves the Bengals.  Both their starting wideouts have reality dating shows currently running on cable, and their third receiver has a history of fighting with his coach and failing drug tests.  Their running back has been charged with marijuana possession, boating drunk, and punching a bartender.  If Carson Palmer rapes a kitten this year, the Bengals will win the Super Bowl.  They get twelve wins, even without the kitten rape.

NFC SOUTH
Can we just give this division to the Saints?  Everybody loves them, everybody’s happy for New Orleans.  In true Mardi Gras fashion, let’s keep the party going.  Fuck the Falcons, Buccaneers, and Panthers.  Nobody wants to watch them play.  The division’s QBs not named Drew Brees are Matt Ryan, Matt Moore, and Josh Freeman.  Now close your eyes and tell me those names right back.  Can’t do it, can you?  That’s a sign of suck.  Saints go 16-0, and the other three teams go winless.  That’s right, every non-Saints divisional game will end in a tie.

AFC SOUTH
Every year, people get high on the Houston Texans.  They talk themselves into their offensive talent and improved defense and think that this will finally be the year that they get over the hump.  There’s reason for it, too — they legitimately get a little better every year, but have never made the playoffs.  They’re the football equivalent of an asymptote.  The Jaguars have a great shot with Maurice Jones-Drew and Mike Sims-Walker, but only if hyphens translated to wins.  The Titans will be better with a full season of an emotionally stable Vince Young, but living in Tennessee might not help matters.  Peyton Manning and the Colts will continue to dominate despite the fact that their head coach has no identity.  I suspect that he might not even have a reflection.  In sum, this division is anybody’s guess.  I’ll go with the Texans in a surprise 11-5 season, just so I can be smug if it happens.  If it doesn’t happen, at least I won’t be surprised.

NFC EAST
Everyone’s excited about this division.  Will the Cowboys play to their potential and become the first team to play a Super Bowl in its home stadium (thereby giving Jerry Jones the biggest hard-on in human history)?  Will Donovan McNabb lead his new Redskins teammates to greatness, or will he throw up on himself and forget the rules?  Will the Eagles shake off their demons, or will they be dragged down by Kevin Kolb’s inexplicably silent L?  And will any more Giants accidentally shoot themselves?  I have no idea, but since I forced myself to make predictions, I’ll say all four teams finish a “strong” 8-8 with the McNabb-free Eagles winning the fourth tiebreaker, which we all know is a coach-played Madden ’11 tournament on Xbox 360.  Andy Reid’s gotta be good at video games — just look at him.

AFC EAST
The only team I like in this division is the Bills.  Unfortunately, they’re also the most depressing and least talented.  Their quarterback is named Trent, for fuck’s sake.  Even worse, their starting running back is CJ Spiller, a name that guarantees two fumbles per game.  The Dolphins won’t be much better, even though they have the magic of Bill Parcells making phone calls.  The Patriots should be raring to go, as Tom Brady is now two years away from his injury, meaning he’ll be in good condition to throw touchdowns and impregnate actresses.  The Jets, though, have the best chance of all because as I’ve intimated repeatedly, names matter.  The New York Jets are owned by a gentleman named Woody Johnson.  That’s your Super Bowl champion right there.

-Darrell