Should You Be Worried About the Virus Expected to Hit on April Fool's Day; and, What Can You Do to Prevent Being Afflicted?

If you're anything like me, you might have gotten an email from your mother, warning you of the dreaded Cornf*cker Virus expected to afflict many people on April Fool's Day, which is tomorrow.

To be honest, I did not fully read the email my mother sent- I rarely read my mother's emails in full. I skimmed it. When I saw the words "cornf*cker," "virus," and "April Fools' Day," I gave up and deleted it.

I do not engage in the type of behavior ("cornf*cking") which might lead to my catching a virus from it. Therefore, I believe I have nothing to worry about.

If you do engage in such behavior, I would suggest using a prophylactic of some kind, unless you're in a committed relationship, or both of you (or all three or four, or whatever, I make no judgments) have been recently tested for viruses and said tests have come back negative. Also, I would test the corn.

I should probably point out that I am not an expert on cornf*cking. Sure, I've done it a few times- who hasn't? But just because I'm experienced, doesn't mean I'm an expert.

To summarize: If you want to cornf*ck, it's your business. Just be safe, and you won't be sorry. And a tip: boiling the corn for ten minutes softens the kernels, but don't forget to let it cool for at least five minutes before proceeding.

I'm Up An Astonishing 135% on imdb This Week- Also a Photo of Me Standing in the Hollywood Sign

On my imdb page, I am way up in popularity this week:



I probably shot to such heights of popularity by checking on my own page, just now.

Zany Dick!'s up 20%:



If only I would spring for "imdb pro," I might be able to find out why my popularity is increasing more than 100%.

Speaking of HOLLYWOOD, here's a picture of me standing in one of the Os (I think it was the first O) on the world-famous HOLLYWOOD sign:



My friend Kimiko, who took the photo, just posted it to her facebook page. It was taken back in mid 2001, when all you had to do to get to the sign was climb under a bit of fencing, and climb about 20 feet or so down the side of the hill on which the sign is located. I've heard that ever since "9/11" it's almost impossible to get in there now. It's just one more thing we've given up in the name of "safety."

I Love Money 2 Synopsis: Tailor Made is the Man, The Tragedy of Flavor of Love Syndrome, and an excerpt from my "I Love Money 2" Fan Fiction

PART FIRST: Flavor of Love Syndrome:
A theory about reality show contestants

I’ve been working on a theory about the contestants who appear on reality shows, in particular those in which the ostensible object is to find “love.” On shows like “Rock of Love,” “Flavor of Love,” and “I Love New York,” contestants behave in, let’s say, odd ways. Irrational ways. Often it seems that the characters come to believe that the “reality” of the show is the actual reality, and they really are there to change their lives in a meaningful way. Now, that might be nothing more than to get fame for themselves, fame that they hope will transfer with them once they’ve left the show.

This leads to a sort of desperation. Every emotion, be it anger, sadness, lust, or even love is felt with greater intensity. Anger becomes rage, which leads to absurd name-calling and an unwarranted sense of betrayal when one character uses strategy to win can be seen as a “snake” who has “knifed you in the back.” Sadness becomes grief, as the character sees his chance to win the game slipping away, he desperately flails at anything that might help him win. But the sense of “love” is the worst of all.

How many contestants on “Rock of Love,” “Flavor of Love,” and “I Love New York” have hurled accusations that another contestant “isn’t there for the right reasons,” or “isn’t really there for Bret” (this season on “Rock of Love Bus,” for instance, Taya the Penthouse Pet has had to contend with this throughout the series- even her “friend” Mindy has accused her of being there strictly to promote her career as a model or, as of last week, a singer, instead of being there “for Bret”), as if that were necessarily bad.

Who in their right mind would appear on a reality television show to find “love” with a rock and roll celebrity, while competing against 20 other women? In what world does it make any sense to put yourself in a situation where one man gets his pick from 20 other women? And why oh why would you get “jealous” of the other girls who are in the exact same situation as you- a situation you yourself agreed to when the show started?

Here’s my theory: When the contestants have been on these shows for a little while- and it might only take a few hours- they begin to buy into the “reality” of the show. It seems possible they might actually be able to find a soulmate in these absurd, tawdry circumstances. Whatever they might have felt, be it a desire to promote themselves (it’s been shown that more and more young people “want to be famous” as a life goal), or lust for the object of the show, or whatever, becomes, in a twisted and roundabout way, a feeling that they mistake for love.

And as the end of the show, and the end of the “reality” of the show gets nearer, the contestants become desperate. Unable to envision a reality outside of the context of the show, they come to see the show as their one chance of happiness. If they do not win, their lives will be a failure. If Bret or New York or Flavor Flav or Real or Chance or Ray J or Daisy picks one of the other contestants, they’ve lost their shot at Happiness with a capital H, and anything else would just be settling.

I’m calling it “Flavor of Love Syndrome.” I expect some enterprising young psychiatrist to present a real paper to an actual medical journal about this, since I myself am not “qualified” in any real sense (other than the fact that I watch a lot of reality shows) to write such a paper. Or maybe it’s just that I’m lazy.

Within the context of “I Love Money,” I present as my evidence the strange case of Frank the Entertainer. This is the man who sucked on New York’s toes on a past season of “I Love New York.” Why would he do such a thing? Toe sucking is fine, if that’s what you’re into, but it’s something you do with someone with whom you have an exclusive romantic relationship. It isn’t something you do with someone who’s dating you and twenty other guys she’s trying to pick from.

Unless you’ve got Flavor of Love Syndrome.

Now consider Frank the Entertainer’s first appearance on the original “I Love Money.” He spent much of his time on the show canoodling with the lovely Destiney from “Rock of Love 2.” There is no way that such a woman could not do better than a toe-sucking 37 year-old man who lives in his parents’ basement. Think about this: Is there any other circumstance, outside of a “reality” show, in which Frank the Entertainer could get to even first base with a woman like Destiney? No, there is not.

Unless she’s got Flavor of Love Syndrome.


Frank the Entertainer with Destiney. The tragic Flavor of Love Syndrome in action.

When Destiney left “I Love Money,” she and Frank assured one another they’d meet again, when everything was over. The implication was that they would continue their romantic adventure in the reality of the real world. How long do you think that lasted?

Now, on “I Love Money 2,” Frank the Entertainer is again canoodling, this time with Becky Buckwild. Again I ask you, is there any way Frank the Entertainer, the toe-sucking 37 year-old man who lives in his parents’ basement, could get to even first base with a woman like Becky Buckwild (assuming, of course, she's not blackout drunk)? No, there is not.

Becky Buckwild has succumbed to Flavor of Love Syndrome. It’s only fitting, given the fact that she made her VH1 reality debut on “Flavor of Love.”

The contestants who do the best on “I Love Money” tend to be immune from this. Megan, for instance (who really should have won last season) made it all the way to the final four by turning the opposing alliance against itself. White Boy and Real turned against each other because of feelings for Hoopz, who herself seemed immune to their charms.

This season, Tailor Made seems immune. Prancer and Ice are going along with him, as is Myammee (I seem to recall Myammee having strong feelings for Buddha, but I might be confabulating that. regardless, he's off the show now). Angelique has it bad for 20 Pack, but 20 Pack has (rather rudely) made it clear he has no interest in her, so she seems to have given up on that. Saaphyri is a wild card- she seems smitten with It, but she’s also been able to see through Frank. It is inscrutable. Cali is a cipher. 20 Pack is clearly not bright- he broke his own hand while celebrating a victory in the boxing challenge, and has taken his “rivalry” with Tailor Made far too seriously. With Frank gone, perhaps Becky Buckwild will become sensible.

But none of them are safe from Flavor of Love Syndrome.

“I could lure you in, I'm so clever with it.
There's really nowhere to run so you can just forget it.
I set a trap and ooh, look how I caught you in it.
I'm an animal, ani-ani-ani.”
-Chris Brown, “Captive”

PART SECOND: A digression:
From my “I Love Money 2” fan fiction / slash fiction piece- a work in progress:

Tailor Made wondered why it was that Saaphyri didn’t excite him. She contained all the qualities he looked for in a woman- velvet skin, voluptuous curves, piercing eyes, fierce intelligence. But he could not bring himself to trust her.

Ironically, it was as he was handing out the checks, seeing her standing there beside the pitifully loathsome Frank the Entertainer that it hit him:

She reminded him of New York.

On his previous reality show experience, “I Love New York,” he had come to believe that the lovely and airy New York was “the one,” the true love of his life. Yes, Frank had sucked her toes in the bathtub, but ultimately she’d chosen him, Tailor Made, and they had ridden off into the sunset together.

But when the sun rose, a mere eight months later, they were apart. Heartbroken, wondering where the next challenge lay, he got the call from VH1 to appear on this, the second season of “I Love Money.” And now here he was, the paymaster, with the fates of Frank the Entertainer and Saaphyri in his hands. Who would get the check?

It couldn’t be Frank, could it? He couldn’t send Saaphyri home- just because she reminded him of his past, of that heartbreaking failure with New York.

He inhaled deeply, felt the dull ache in his chest- the same dull ache he always felt when he thought of her. “I love New York,” he thought, bitterly.

“Frank, come up here, please,” he said. The statement was followed by more words, more justification, but even he wasn’t listening to himself. Fighting back the memories that were becoming increasingly bitter to him, he announced that Frank’s check was to voided.

Whatever the justification, whatever he’d been through to get to this point, he knew he’d made the right choice. Frank, the man who’d sucked on his beloved New York’s toes, was banished to his parents’ basement.

Saaphyri- the woman in whom he saw an echo of New York, he just couldn’t help himself- would remain. Did he keep her because she reminded him of that lost love, or did he keep her because it made the most sense strategically?

Becky Buckwild leapt into Frank’s arms and began passionately kissing him. The mumbled to one another, empty promises of some future rendezvous. Tailor Made was hardly interested, but they were directly in front of him, as if to flaunt their passion.

Did they think he really cared-

Wait. Did Becky Buckwild look him in the eye? As she kissed Frank, she glanced at Tailor Made from the corner of her eye; he was sure he saw it.

*

Becky Buckwild knew it was wrong, this feeling toward Tailor Made, but seeing him there, with Frank’s fate in his hand, holding himself with such dignity and power, she couldn’t help herself. She felt that all-too familiar stirring in her crotch.

No, she should be lamenting the loss of Frank! Ignore Tailor Made- he is the snake! The enemy! The leader of the rival alliance!

Frank was nothing more to her than a distraction. A welcome one, to be sure, but just a distraction. He was big, his body felt good against hers in bed, but there was so little going on in his head that he could have been almost anyone.

Frank the Entertainer was just an entertainer. Seeing them all now, as Frank was being eliminated, she realized that Tailor Made was the real man. That his brain was bigger than Frank’s muscles.

Now the felt the moistness between her legs. Oh, help her- she was falling for Tailor Made!

As Frank’s check was voided, she rushed into Frank’s arms, as if feeling his physical presence, pressing his body against hers, would somehow protect her from these feelings for Tailor Made- the snake. She pressed her lips hard against Frank’s (those same lips that had so lovingly sucked on New York’s toes, she thought fleetingly, unable to help herself) but her eye wandered.

Tailor Made was there, not more than three feet from them. The look on his face- the look she’d mistaken for smugness, the face she’d wanted to smash just a few hours before- she now realized was one of quiet confidence and intelligence.

Look away! Back to Frank- It was Frank who was making her wet, not Tailor Made! Kiss him harder. It is Frank. Frank- Frank-

Tailor Made.

As they went back into the house, Becky forced herself to look disappointed. She forced herself to glare at Tailor Made. She forced herself to shout insults at him. For a few minutes, she even managed to convince herself that she hated him, that she resented him for eliminating Frank.

She moved close to him, her face next to Tailor Made’s, and shouted at him. She felt his breath, hot against her face, and resisted the urge to kiss him. Her passion was rising- she disguised it by shouting at him even louder, by calling him every filthy name she could think of.

She wanted him. If he didn’t want her, she would hate him again. She hoped he didn’t want her. She desperately hoped he did want her. Oh, god, how much longer?

*

Tailor Made wondered why she felt the need to be so close to him as she shouted at him. He could have heard her from across the room. As it was, her voice was like a physical presence, pressing against him. Her breath, heavy with the sweet odor of tequila, covered his face.

He wanted her on his face.

No- they were enemies. This was insane. She hated him. She had pledged herself to Frank. Frank the toe-sucker, who lived with his parents. Frank, whose hubris had caused him to fail at this game for a second time. Frank, the man he’d vanquished in two reality shows.

Becky Buckwild would be his.

“Listen, Becky, if you want to discuss this rationally--”

It was what she’d desperately wanted to hear. “I don’t wanna talk about nothing with you, you lying turtle-faced snake in da grass!” she shouted, as if the volume would make it true.

“Well, then stop yelling at me.” Tailor Made’s voice was calm, confident. How much longer could she resist him?

“Don’t you tell me what to do!” she shouted. Tailor Made wondered how much longer he could resist this passionate, beautiful and voluble woman, whose voice was like angels farting.

He grabbed her arm. “We settle this. Now,” he said, intensity reflected in his eyes. He pulled her into the bathroom, away from the cameras. Slamming the door behind them, he pushed her against the sink. “One way or the other,” he said. Their lips were so close… close enough to…

Kiss.

Their mouths were pressed against each other, tongues tangled, lips dripping with saliva, they kissed hungrily.

He removed her shorts and bikini bottoms, and she told him, “Wait, stop a minute,” and before he had a chance to tell her he couldn’t wait another minute, it was like torture, she removed her tampon and threw it against the wall, where it stuck.

“Now, get in that box,” she said, pulling him close to her.

Their lovemaking was intense and frenzied. It was so wrong, they hated each other, they were rivals, they were lovers, it was so right.

*

Why can’t I imagine a scenario in which Becky Buckwild and Tailor Made hook up? They’re perfect for each other, and it’s not like either of them has made any great romantic decisions on these VH1 reality shows in the past. Seriously, Buckwild has gone after Flavor Flav and Frank the Entertainer, while Tailor Made has gone after New York. They could both do a lot worse-- they both already have.


PART THIRD:
“I Love Money 2” synopsis for the March 30, 2009 episode:


Remember when Prancer spared Cali, and sent Milf home? Remember when Myammee wore this outfit?

Overall, a sense of listless melancholia has fallen over the house. With Frank gone, the volume has turned down, and with the dissolution of the "green" and "yellow" teams, certain characters seem to be floundering.

But we've still got the alliances: Tailor Made has dubbed his group "The Underdogs," a brilliant bit of politicking (who doesn't love an underdog?): Himself, Myammee, Prancer, Ice, and It. Their opposition is "The Bullies," which consist of 20 Pack, Cali, Angelique, Frenchy, Saaphyri, and Becky Buckwild.

20 Pack's main objective: get that snake Tailor Made out of the house.

Cali's main objective: "slide and glide" through to the end. Cali of course is the true snake, betraying Prancer after she'd spared her, hoping to ride 20 Pack's coattails to the end. This is what is known in the world of VH1 reality as "foreshadowing."

The challenge this week was called "Under the Bus," in which contestants must throw mannequins representing each of the contestants (and a few representing Craig, the host) into a target zone, which will then be run over by a truck. It's a wonderfully literal representation of what all of these characters have done at one time or another.

"The Bullies" prove their stupidity. At some point, I'm sure Tailor Made has got to start thinking, "Man this is just too easy." They do not coordinate. Their actions make no sense.

The "Dead-Last Loser," whose check automatically goes into the box, is pathetic Cali. The last three standing are all "Underdogs," Tailor Made, Prancer, and Ice.

Ice, by the way, proves herself a great competitor, remembering where the dummy for 20 Pack is located, running right to it, and eliminating him.

But the important thing is, TAILOR MADE IS PAYMASTER AGAIN!

20 Pack is pissed off!

Becky Buckwild is pissed off!

Tailor Made modestly states that it's time for him to exercise control of this game; start planting some seeds to get rid of 20 Pack. Tailor Made has had control of the game from the beginning.

He goes to Saaphyri, who states that she is playing both sides, and will tell Tailor Made whatever he wants to hear. She then states that she thinks he's "kinda sexy" (a serious understatement at this point) and asks him what kind of breasts he likes. Tailor Made demurs-- he wants her to help him get 20 Pack up for elimination.

20 Pack, meanwhile, is trying to figure how to save his own ass. He goes to Saaphyri, who suggests they offer Cali up as a sacrifice, and vote a couple of other "Underdogs," It and Myammee, into the box.

Tailor Made goes to Cali. Just sit out the vote, he tells her. Don't raise your hand for anyone, and make sure 20 Pack and another of the "Bullies" gets into the box, and you will be safe. Cali, the snake, mumbles something about "going out the loyal way."

Tailor Made says that unless Cali is a complete idiot, she's not going to vote against any Underdogs. Of course, Tailor Made has overestimated Cali's intelligence.

She makes Frank the Entertainer look like It. Cali is that dumb.

She votes for Myammee and It.

Tailor Made then ruins the suspense by stating, before the Power Outing: "Cali is an idiot. All she had to do was nothing. And today, she's leaving Mexico."

20 Pack feels that Tailor Made "owes him something." His logic is not logical. Cali, who is stupid, must use her understanding of 20 Pack's logic to convince Tailor Made to change his mind.

During the meal, Cali forgets all the great stuff that 20 Pack told her. Tailor Made was wrong in this sense: Cali is not just an idiot, she's also inarticulate. TM gives her one more chance, agreeing to spend his alone time with her, so she can plead her case. Cali tells him that 20 Pack will work with him, if he keeps Cali around. TM wonders why 20 Pack doesn't tell him this himself.


Cali pointing out her only two assets. Perhaps she should have emphasized those during her Power Outing.

After the Power Outing, back at the house, 20 Pack goes to Tailor Made and makes that case. He emphasizes Cali's loyalty to him, apparently forgetting that Cali the snake has already betrayed TM's good friend and ally Prancer. There's a manipulative flashback to "I Love New York," to It's betrayal of TM by taking credit for the flowers TM ordered. There's another flashback to "Flavor of Love 3," in which Myammee did- well, something, I don't remember what.

Tailor Made seems to be wavering. Uh-oh.

By the way: It's great to see Myammee in the box, because she wears only a bra and panties. Wow oh wow is she hot. I mean, she is smoking hot.


There is no way Myammee could be eliminated; just look at her.

It is wearing a cape.

First check to Myammee, who as I have mentioned is hot, and who tells TM that he is her dog, or perhaps it's spelled "dawg."

Ever the showman, Tailor Made calls both Cali and It to the box. He says he's not going to void Cali's check--

Prancer is.


I wanted a picture of Prancer, and I found one with Myammee in it. They're both hot.

Cali betrayed Prancer. She voted for Myammee and It. She is a moron who cannot stay. Prancer gets her revenge.

Tailor Made is so far above all the other characters on this show, it's almost pathetic. He is the greatest VH1 reality show character of all time. By contrast, the very hot Myammee calls Cali the dumbest one on the history of VH1's reality shows.

Quite a statement, but it's hard to argue with her.

Cali seems to agree, as in her exit interview she says she already regrets it. She should. You can find nude photos of her here.

Anyway, for one more week, Tailor Made is in charge, and all is right with the world.

Mucophilia!

Mucophiliacs are people who love sneezing. I mean really love it. They love to watch people sneeze. They love to sneeze themselves. They love the feeling of an... tici... pation, that sweet moment of expectation just before the sneeze occurs. They love sneezes.

Something called "Attack of the Show" on G4 covered it:



But as with so many things, singer Tori Amos was way out in front of this, as evidenced by this clip from 1996:



I managed to find this mucophilia "collector's item" clip of President Barack Obama sneezing. One of President Obama's greatest skills is to appeal to everyone, no matter their fetish:



Sneezing models on a boat. So many hot allergens on the open sea:



Actually, it kind of ruins it for me to see them sticking q-tips into their nostrils. Isn't it much more exciting to see the natural sneezes- the wonderfully unexpected bursts from the nose- as opposed to those which have been "forced"?

I shouldn't talk, because I really don't know anything about this. I don't share this particular fetish, but of course I don't judge. I am extremely idiosyncratic myself.

It's amazing and wonderful that we live in such a world, where mucophiliacs can find as many sneezing videos as they could hope for, where they can gather and share these videos, and exchange information. Mucophiliacs, I do not share your love of sneezing, but I salute you:

Ahhh- CHOOO!!!

Anyway, for those who are into this sort of thing, I offer Sneezing panda:

Did "Real Time with Bill Maher" Rip Me Off?

Compare their "SnugWow" commercial:



With my snuggie shamwow "As Seen on TV" Christmas entry from December 7, 2008 here.

I think it's clear that they probably did not rip me off, and that my headline was nothing more than an inflammatory attempt to increase traffic to my blog. Will it work? Let's just say I don't know.

Apparently in England The Government Has Money To Waste on Psychic Pscumbags

The Mail Online has a story about a pair of psychic pscumbags who have been given a grant by the British government to open a psychic pschool:

Two clairvoyants have been awarded a £4,500 government grant to set up a school for psychics.

Paul and Deborah Rees had their palms crossed with taxpayers' silver after applying for funding through a Department for Work and Pensions job creation scheme.

The couple's Accolade Academy of Psychic and Mediumistic Studies aims to train people to contact 'the other side'.

I wonder if the pschool will be anything like the Spirit Academy "reality show" that Shirley Ghostman created on "High Spirits"?



Something tells me it will be exactly like that.

Anyway, as irritating as this is, it's heartening to know that in England the economy is so good that they have money to waste on total bulls hit. I guess this guy, this Daniel Hannan, who's become a sensation on YouTube by dressing down Prime Minister Gordon Brown about the state of England's economy, must be full of beans:

Tree Friends at Funny or Die

Tree Friends - watch more funny videos

A new video I just made tonight. Not safe for work.

I made it in honor of "Earth Hour," it's my special way of dealing with issues related to the environment which is, after children, our most precious natural resource.

UPDATE 3/27/09 approx 10 AM: I went ahead and posted it on YouTube, despite the fact that I've had some problems with them re: "adult" material being removed and all.

RE: John McEnroe Duped in Art Scam

Yahoo has the story of John McEnroe, Bank of America, and others being duped in an $88 Million art scam in New York.

Art dealer Lawrence Salander, 59, was arrested at his New York home on Thursday, when he and his gallery were charged with 100 counts, including grand larceny and securities fraud, Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau told a news conference.

I managed to get my hands on one of the pieces of "art" that this Lawrence Salander was allegedly representing- something called "Gaugan's Tree Frienbs":



While I sympathize with the fact that most people are not the Gaugan expert that I am, I find it difficult to believe that anyone would fall for this. For one thing, "Gaugan" was actually spelled "Gauguin," not "Gaugan." Anyone with internet access could have figured that out within a few minutes. For another, "friends" is spelled "friends," not "frienbs."

To be honest, this picture looks like it was either created by someone with diminished mental capacity, or a small child, or perhaps a small child with diminished mental capacity. The fact that $1.7 Million was charged for this leads me to believe that I am in the wrong business.

Anyway, of course my heart goes out to the victims.

Hilarious Comic About Time Travel

The word "hilarious" is used in the loosest sense, probably. But it does deal with some serious issues raised by time travel, and interacting with early humans, evolution, technology, that sort of thing. It will make you think, is what I think I'm trying to say.

PS I should probably apologize for my handwriting.

More of What Would Happen If Barack Obama Wrote the Comic Strip Ziggy

I took lines spoken by President Obama at last night's press conference (Tuesday March 24, 2009 transcript here) and dropped them into recent Ziggy comic strips. The result improves upon both the comic strip Ziggy and the press conference.

8 Easy Tips for Avoiding Financial Ruin in These Difficult Economic Times

I'm no economist, but I do have an advanced degree from the "school of hard knocks." There are some things you can do to prevent total financial ruin (some financial ruin is inevitable) in these difficult economic times. Here they are in no particular order:

(1) Be mobile with your money.

Banks are failing to the left of you, and to the right of you. They’re failing all over the place. I don’t mean to make you panic, but your bank is probably next. In that case, open a new account at another bank and transfer all your money into that account. Once you’ve done that, you can then move all your money into yet another account, at another bank, because chances are the new bank you just chose is about to fail, too. Keep doing that. The financially savvy citizen knows it’s important to always stay one step ahead.

(2) Don’t draw attention to yourself at work.

They can’t downsize you if they don’t know you’re there. Go into your office or factory or supercenter or fast food restaurant or wherever you work as quietly as possible. Don’t make eye contact with your boss. Then leave as quietly as you arrived. If you work near something large, why not try hiding under it?

(3) Foie gras vs Spam

Most people don't know what foie gras looks like, so what I've been doing is re-using the same foie gras tin packaging for the last year or so, replacing the long-ago eaten contents with "Spam." My guests are all impressed and Spam is about $95 an ounce cheaper. I keep my foie gras for myself.

(4) Your dog's food

This is a super-secret trick for all my dog-loving readers! Many dogs eat their own feces. So now when they make number two, why not collect it in a bag and, rather than throw it in the trash, keep it, and serve it back to the dog later? This will cut your dog food bills in half!

(5) Oral hygiene

Bleach is an inexpensive alternative to mouthwash.

(6) A cheap high

A cheap high can be obtained by defecating into a plastic bag and pouring 12 ounces of Coke into it. Allow to ferment overnight, and by the morning it will be ready for "duking" (as it's known on the streets). Huff and enjoy!

(7) Public transportation.

Gas is expensive. Seriously, have you seen the prices per gallon? It’s almost as expensive as printer ink. Take a ride, and meet your smelly neighbors, on the city bus. If anyone asks, tell them you’re being “environmentally conscious,” instead of just “painfully poor.”

(8) Read my blog.

As this entry has suggested, I have the secrets that will get you through this.

I hope this helps you as much as it's helped me. Thanks so much!

I Love Money 2 Continues to Impress

There are few things more wonderful in life than seeing someone whose best qualities are his obnoxiousness and loudness-- who thinks that everything is under his all-powerful control and he cannot be stopped-- tumble and fall like the douchebag he is.

This week on "I Love Money 2," viewers were treated to the sight of the loathsome, obnoxious, slightly moronic Frank the Entertainer being eliminated from the show he so desperately needed to win. To get out of his parents' basement.

It's so difficult, as a fan of the show, not to swell with pride. I can't imagine what Tailor Made, the Dwight Eisenhower of "I Love Money," went through while the episode was filming. The culmination of all his carefully-laid plans; how every piece fell so perfectly into place. In such a situation, when righteousness triumphs over buffoonery, can one not gloat?

The episode began with Frank the Entertainer believing he had the game under control, bragging about his ridiculous alliance, sure that absolutely nothing could go wrong for him. Yelling, asserting his illusive power like some sort of wild, stupid animal, so so certain that nothing could go wrong for him.

His fellow green team member and fellow alliance member Saaphyri was named captain of the green team, somewhere off screen apparently because I didn't catch it. Didn't matter- it was unimportant.

The important thing was, the oddly alluring Becky Buckwild made an enfeebled attempt at trying for the captaincy of the yellow team, only the swatted down, almost off-handedly, by Tailor Made, Ice, and Prancer. Tailor Made was the captain.

Take that Buckwild! Take that, Entertainer!

Sapphyri and TM are asked to disclose the names of the two team members they trust the most. TM of course selects Ice and Prancer, while Saaphyri selects- oh, I don't really remember. It doesn't matter.

The green team lost! In a challenge that seems eerily similar to the challenge that ended Frank's tenure on the previous season of I Love Money, the yellow team pulls it out, and someone from the green team- Frank's team- is going home.

Because there is no doubt that Frank will be the one going home, the fun of the episode is getting to that delightful moment.

Tailor Made and Myammee corner It, and convince him to join them in thwarting the green team's efforts to select three team members to put up for elimination.

I have not written about It yet, mainly because he's been little-seen thus far. He has managed to stay under the radar, avoiding overt alignment with either the Entertainer's or TM's alliances. The lovably dazed and confused young man, whose charmingly slurred speaking style has endeared him to anyone with a heart, has relied on his "good looks" (Saaphyri thinks he's hot, and enjoys cuddling with him in bed, but has a low opinion of his intellect) thus far, but TM assures him that it's time for him to take a stand. Will he be with TM, or the Entertainer? With the forces of good, or stupidness? Because if It is sent up for elimination, and he will be, that's for sure, then TM will send him home.


It is charming. It is in it for the money. It is barely verbal.

It doesn't want to go home.

It wants to work his magic on Saaphyri.

It speaks to Saaphyri.

It turns Saaphyri on Frank.


Saaphyri is smarter than Frank the Entertainer, but then, a gnat with a lobotomy is smarter than Frank the Entertainer.

Prior to entering the Vault, Frank the Entertainer attempts to get the others on the green team to vote for someone, anyone other than himself. But he. is. so. stupid. that he cannot bring himself to display any sort of cohesive "leadership" or "strategy."

If you don't watch the show, I have no words to adequately express this: Frank the Entertainer is missing something in his brains.

In the Vault, Saaphyri wastes no time. Within seconds of the start of deliberation, Saaphyri asks, "Who wants Frank in the box?"

Three hands raise. Frank is slowly, so slowly it's all the more sweet, coming to realize that he is not the raging intellect he believes he is. He is a jerk that's being played.

The green team is unable to decide on three to nominate for elimination, so TM gets to decide for them.

This could not be any better. TM selects Saaphyri, Frenchy (Angelique), and Frank. Frank, still filled with moronic hubris, cannot believe he's up for elimination. How could this have happened? he wonders. The fact that he can't understand the why is all the answer the viewer needs.

On the Power Outing, Frank decides to pour on the charm. Frank has no charm. He has no political skills. He tells TM that if he is not eliminated, he'll have TM's back. He'll join with TM's alliance. He says that Saaphyri is a "snake," and can't be trusted. (By the way, on this show, when a contestant calls another contestant a snake, it means he feels like he's being outsmarted by him. It's the ultimate compliment.) TM insists that he believes Frank is trustworthy, more trustworthy than Saaphyri, but I suspect it's all for show. TM is not stupid.

It was Frank. It was always Frank. It was always going to be Frank. From the moment this season began, it was going to be Frank. Tailor Made eliminated Frank the Entertainer. Light beat darkness. Good destroyed evil. Calmness crushed buffoonery. For one week, at least, everything is right with the world.


With Frank the Entertainer gone, Becky Buckwild thinks she has no one else to canoodle with. She has terrible taste in men. I think I might have a chance.

Frank, the ultimate loser, is sent home to his parents' basement. As Saaphyri said, How can you trust a 37 year old man who still lives in his parents' basement? You cannot. You should not. Frank is out.

His parting gift is a sloppy kiss from Becky Buckwild, proving that she had odd taste all the way to the end.

Next week, the teams are dissolved and it's everyone for himself. I am tingling.


Frank, now that it's over, any regrets?

Notes of Classic Literature: An Explication/Examination/Explanation of William Shakespeare's Sonnet 29

Sonnet XXIX.

“When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes”

WHEN in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur’d like him, like him with friends possess’d,
Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee,—and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven’s gate;
For thy sweet love remember’d such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

Anyone who’s seen the film “Pretty Woman” knows how important this sonnet is. It is a great way to get women to like you more, and to sleep with you, which is what all great poems do. But what is the poem really about? Or, put another way, what is the poem saying, and what am I saying when I say the poem out loud?

The first thing to remember is that the author, William Shakespeare (“shack-uh-SPEER-ee,” sometimes mispronounced “shake-SPEER”), lived from 15__ to 16__, about 400 years ago. That explains why some of the language “does not fall pleasingly upon the ears” (Wordsworthfellow, 1810) of the modern reader. It also explains why some of the words are “confusing” (James, 1794). But once we learn about William the poet's time, and his use of popular slang, a whole new world opens up to the modern reader.

Title: Sonnet XXIX

The word “sonnet” is defined as a type of poem that William Hamlet and others of his era produced. It was typically used as the format for poems meant to impress ladies the poets wished to sleep with, or men who were paying the poets to author poems. People used to do that. Today, of course, poets write television commercial jingles and ringtones. “XXIX” refers to the poem’s placement amongst the other poems. It is a printer’s error.

WHEN in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes

The poem begins with the poet feeling sorry for himself. He is disgraced by fortune (he has very little money) and other men don’t like him.

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

Because other men don’t like him, he beweeping alone. An “outcast” is defined as someone who has been “cast out,” again a reference to his not having any friends. The point is that the author sure is sad and lonely.

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,

But he whines about it to anyone who will listen, even if they’re not listening. Heaven, in this case, is deaf, which means Heaven (likely a stripper name, possibly Heaven Devine, although scholars are unsure on this point) can’t hear anything anyway. This of course is meant to be ironic, Heaven isn’t literally deaf, she’s just a stripper, and they’re paid to indulge the clients while dancing for them, or giving them lap dances. Just don’t try to touch them! That brings out the bouncers, and they really have no sympathy.

“Bootless cries” is a clear reference to Gargantua Pantagruel’s famous poem “Rabelais,” in which we learn “the boots of the cries/trample children ‘neath them/with effective despise”. The author, William Othello, is stating that his crying has not the same trampling effect as Pantagruel’s. It’s rumored that Pantagruel and Othello actually met, although that might be apocryphal.

And look upon myself, and curse my fate,

“Oh, the huge vanity!” as Brownstone wrote in 1880. But this is an unfair misunderpropriation of the terminology as William the poet used it in his time. Commonly, it was believed that those who “stared at themselves” were insane, and were to be committed to psychiatric hospital. Such a “fate” would indeed be “cursed.”

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Me like this line, because the playful structure of the sentence, in which the author refers to himself as “me” and dropping the quantintative usurper “were” (i.e., “Wishing I were more like someone who weren’t so loathsome and stupid”), clearly denotes the mind of one who is insane, per the previous line. Moreover, the author, already established to be poor of money and possessions, is shown here to be lacking in “hope” as well. He would rather have “hope” than “money,” but “hope” doesn’t put food on the table, money does- another example of the deranged mind in action.

Featur’d like him, like him with friends possess’d,

Here we learn the problems with the iambs as set forth by the sonnet template. In order to qualify as a “sonnet,” each line of the poem must have a certain number of syllables (I’ll leave it for the reader to figure just how many syllables that is), which means that you have to drop in a lot of words that make no sense, such as “featured,” but you also have to remove a syllable from said word (“e”) in order to make it fit your template. The man is saying his “him” (not spelled “hymn,” or “song of religious devotion”) is without friends, by which he means that the strippers will not truly love him (“him,” not “hymn”- as I’ve said, this is a confusing poem). His life is devoid of friendship, even he now understands the strippers are only in it for the money, and he has stated he does not have money. As Bonny John Donne bragged in 1607 in response to this poem, “the hymn of him of the sonnet twenty-nine/Was shown to have nothing, nothing of mine” (“friends”).

Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope,

Here the jealousy of the narrator comes through. At the time William Cymbeline wrote this poem, the term “art” referred to “sexual prowess,” and “scope” (which is short for “telescope”) meant “penis” (as Galileo put it so eloquently, “the telescope telescopes outward when aroused by the sight of stars” --some science scholars argue that this was the real reason Galileo went blind). The poet is expressing his sexual inadequacy- a bold statement for the times, when sexual inadequacy was not looked upon with same magnanimity as it is today (“it’s okay; it happens to everybody at one time or another”). As Shelley Keats put it in his famous 1812 poem “Spring Break ’12,” “Help me deal with my telescope’s changes/Please point out where all the strange is”.

Note: there is some debate over whether or not the line is meant to imply anything homosexual about the poem. As I’ve already stated, the lines above clearly imply that the author is at a strip club. Perhaps he is over-compensating, as Camille Paglia has argued (“Sonnet 29 is All About Homosexuality,” Chronicle of Higher Education, Spring 1989), attending strip clubs to “mask” his true feelings. I would argue this is not the case, but I don’t feel it’s important enough to argue one way or the other. If the reader chooses to believe that William Juliet was writing this poem to a man, that is his/her business. But I think that’s full of beans.

With what I most enjoy contented least;

Here the substitution of the word “contented” for “counted” is a playful way for the author add syllables to the line. He is lamenting the fact that he is impotent- he can watch the strippers with their "supple, nubile bodies grinding, undulating, and gyrating with the pulsating rhythms of the fevered night” (Behn, “The Town Fop,” 1676), but his penis cannot become “sufficiently engorged with blood to make it hard enough to insert into a woman’s oven” (Behn, “The False Count,” 1681).

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Clearly, the author is being ironic in this line. There’s no “almost” about it- the impotent bastard clearly despises himself, because he’s a despicable character. As Litotes has said in his famous history of the period “The History of the Period,” “Any man who cannot get it up will be full of self-loathing and hatred for himself, which is just two ways of saying the same thing, but it is important enough to be restated.” “Important” enough, especially when the “r” is dropped from that word!

Haply I think on thee,—and then my state,

After starting with a made-up word so as to fit his syllable count, the author then begins to turn the tide of his feelings away from the self-loathing, to think on “thee blank.” Many have wondered about the addition of an extra “e” to the word “the,” and moreover wondered about the word that is hidden by the “—“. I can tell you that the “—“ is meant to stand in for “vagina.” Unfortunately, in William Lear’s time, there were no slang terms for “vagina.” It was considered so vulgar that it was unpublishable, as was any reference to it (How that would change in just a few short years with the publication of Robert Herrick’s famous “Ode to Julia’s Vagina” in 1622!). This is another example of why I believe the poem is heterosexual in nature. (The extra “e,” by the way, is meant to replace the e from the word “possess’d” [see above].) The narrator is hopeful that he will be able to become erect by thinking about vaginas, and all he can do is think about them, since he is probably in a mental hospital, as I’ve already established.

I should add that “state” is another slang term for “penis.” It’s been calculated that there were approximately 28,000 slang terms for penis during William the poet’s time.

Like to the lark at break of day arising

He compares his penis (“state”) to a bird (“lark”) flying (“arising”). Now things have really changed for the narrator! After all his impotence, just thinking about the vagina of the subject of this poem is enough to get it up again! Hooray for him! Also, this is where we get the term “morning wood,” where you wake up in the morning (“break of day”) with a boner (“arising”). As Duvet put it, “Awakened at the break of day/The cock a-crowing twice/Rolled over for a morning lay/Damn that sure was nice” (1744).

From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven’s gate;

Ejaculation! The “sullen earth” was his former impotence (“earth” was a slang term for “penis” in William Antony’s time), and “singing” was a slang term for “ejaculation.” (Aside: It’s estimated that there were at least as many slang terms for ejaculation as there were for penis. Ironically, there were also slang terms for female ejaculation- see Christopher Marlowe’s “Dido, Queen of Carthage” from 1586 [“carthage” was a slang term for female ejaculation].) The narrator has overcome his problem, and just in time, because the poem is almost over.

For thy sweet love remember’d such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

This couplet (two lines that rhyme) brings together everything we’ve seen in the poem up to this point, from dropping syllables (“e” in “remembered”), to making up words to fit his cadence (“scorn” for “masturbate”). “Wealth” is a slang term for “ejaculation.” There is some argument in literary circles over whether or not the term “sweet love” was actually a slang term for vagina, but the evidence is shaky at best (see above for my explanation of why I don't believe it's so), and I want to deal only with what we literary scholars know for absolute certainty. Instead, I’ll simply rephrase the couplet in modern terms:

"Thinking about your lovemaking prowess causes me to ejaculate,
But unfortunately you’re not here, so I must masturbate."

I hope this explication of William Shakespeare’s famous 29th Sonnet has been helpful to you, the modern reader, and I hope you’ll think of me when you masturbate.

Ricky Sprague
March 22, 2009

Daily Affirmations With Mr Rogers of "Mr Rogers' Neighborhood"

Remember "Mr Rogers' Neighborhood," hosted by the very pleasant and deliberate Mr Fred Rogers? When I was a kid, we used to make fun of him, and watch "Sesame Street" and "The Electric Company." But I just found some postcards I've had for about 15 years, featuring positive messages to help bolster your self-esteem, and I thought that, given the fact that we're currently in a recession or depression or whatever we're currently in, I would post them here for the world to enjoy.

Enjoy.

Barack Obama and Reverse Speech- Thank You, Satan- Sub-Earth, the Mark that's Now Sooner

Only today I learned about something called "Reverse Speech," which is- I'll let an "expert" explain:

It has been called the discovery of the 7th sense. The research into this phenomenon has been described as being of "Nobel calibre". It has been featured in numerous publications around the world, and in the United States it became a household name in the late 90s. It is called Reverse Speech, the phenomenon of hidden backward messages in speech. It initially gained worldwide fame in the early 80s as those strange backward messages in rock and roll. Since that time, research has progressed significantly and it is now known to exist in all forms of human speech.

If human speech is recorded and played backwards, mixed amongst the gibberish at regular intervals can be heard very clear statements. These statements usually appear in short sentence form and are nearly always related to the forward speech. It appears constantly throughout language, so much so in fact, that it is believed to be a natural part of our speech processes.

Okay that's probably enough. I've never heard of it before today, and I try to keep up on pseudoscience, so I don't think it's fair to say it became a "household name" in the 1990s.

But, apparently I've either been asleep or I just thought this nonsense was so unworthy of my attention that I ignored it because it's apparently been used to assess the guilt of JonBenet Ramsey's parents in her death, and has shown that aliens are here among us now, hoping to collect our meat. Maybe these aliens killed poor JonBenet Ramsey?

"Those strange backward messages in rock and roll" were debunked long ago. It looks like reverse speech is sort of the "Intelligent Design" to backmasking's "creationism." A new way of expressing something old and totally bogus.

Nevertheless, some of the reverse speech exposes of Barack Obama's speeches are fairly entertaining:









Obama wants us to follow Satan, or Zeus, or something else. He's also a hero who doesn't want immigrants to learn to speak English and wishes death on anyone who doubts him.



That last one is the one that I guess kind of started the Obama reverse speech movement- it's an interview with the guy who accused Obama of buying drugs from him, and then having sex with him. We can tell the story is true because if you play parts of it backwards, it sounds like he's saying- well, a bunch of stuff that proves his sincerity.

Whenever I see anything like this, I'm always amazed by the amount of time and effort that went into producing it. Each of those videos took several hours, possibly even days, to put together. Couldn't these people have found more productive ways of using their time? I mean, I get it, they think this is real and that Barack Obama is a harbinger of doom, but come on. Fight the stimulus(es) and bailouts, for crying out loud.

Reverse speech is not real.

Another Story by Joel S Muttoe

NOTE: This entry is cross-posted at my brand-new blog celebrating the life of the unfairly-obscure author Joel S Muttoe, called Gelid Sebborhhea.






In December of 1972, Alkahest House publishers released an all-new printing of Joel S Muttoe's story collection "Slab Sputum" under the title "The Dreaming Gazelle." It was a fairly shameless attempt to cash in on the success of that spiritual animal story, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, which by that time had sold approximately 100 million copies. Of course, Richard Bach's novella is, shall we say, wistful, while Muttoe's story is an uncompromising look at life from the perspective of someone who is, shall we say, a little more eccentric. Alkahest House recruited Jefferson Airplane singer Grace Slick (an avowed Muttoe fan) to write the introduction, but even that wasn't enough to keep the volume in print. It hit the remainder shelves within a couple of weeks of its release- anyone who bought this book expecting something like "Seagull" could be forgiven for feeling they'd been violated. Still, Alkahest's headquarters was subjected to rioting by angry patrons demanding a full refund of the purchase price ($1.95 hadcover), which was probably excessive. The rioting, not the cover price.

To my knowledge, this is the only time in recent memory when a short story collection caused a riot in America.

I've scanned the cover of the 1972 edition, along with scans of the story from the original 1934 "Slab Sputum" printing, because my 1972 edition is so cheap that it cannot be opened without it turning to dust. Ironic, when you think about it, considering one of the stories in the collection is "Moldering Volume."

Another Brilliant Episode of I Love Money 2

Becky Buckwild is the most cubist of all the I Love Money characters.

I don't have the vocabulary to adequately express the level of wonder and enchantment of each episode of VH1's "I Love Money 2". It is constantly surprising, bizarre, infuriating, and vastly entertaining. It's like trying to explain to someone why you love a cubist painting- "I love the beautiful chaos," or "the expression of never-ending movement in a stationary medium" - just look at the damn thing, then try to look away. If you can, you're either a bigger person than I am, or you just don't get it.

I don't mean to be hyperbolic, but this week's episode was better than last week's, and last week's episode was the single greatest hour of television in history. We start with fallout from last week's episode, when the appropriately named Frank the Entertainer had to eliminate his drunken, depressed, and none-too-bright cohort, Heat. Naturally, Frank and the other members of his alliance did not handle this setback with aplomb. On the contrary, they got into the faces of the hated Prancer and Tailor Made, shouting vituperative reproaches, and throwing their clothing around the room, in a display that mixed the intimidating with the pathetic.



"You turtle-faced bitch!" No, I do not know why Buckwild chose to insult Prancer in this way.

From there, the teams picked their captains- the green team selected Angelique, a proud stripper with enormous, surgically enhanced breasts and lips, whose subtitles have an accent, and the yellow team selected the tragic hero Bonez, a man whose integrity and spirituality mean more to him than money. Or common sense.


Angelique speaks with an accent, a fact the show nevair leets yeew forgeet.

The challenge involved the teams searching for coins encased in a giant block of ice. Members of the teams sat on, licked, and rubbed the ice in an attempt to get break the block down. For each coin retrieved, the team leader, dressed in a Mexican outfit the host assures us is "authentic," can remove one item of clothing. Angelique, a proud stripper (as I've mentioned before but it bears repeating since she mentions it herself over and over again), loves the idea of removing clothes. She would go naked or "nakeed" all the time if she could.

The yellow team would have won, if not for the sinister machinations of Becky Buckwild. She retrieves the team's final gold coin, but promptly runs out into the ocean and hurls it away, forever sinking her team's chances.

Now the yellow team must put three people up for elimination. Of course Becky Buckwild and 20 Pack will go into the box. But who from Tailor Made's alliance will join them? It must be someone who is likable, and who might have the best chance of convincing the strange and cartoonish Angelique to join their alliance.

Everyone hates Tailor Made and Prancer, so they're out. Ice is just Ice, and she really hasn't had a chance to develop as a character yet. So, in a move that would come to a surprise to no one who watches the show, Bonez, the thin, soft-spoken and highly religious man, is sent on the Power Outing with Angelique.

First, Angelique throws herself on 20 Pack. She wants a kiss, but he's reluctant. Still, she holds his fate in her hands, so he relents, to a degree, allowing her to straddle him on the beach, and flash her ample breasts at him. He makes a face, as if to express that he's unimpressed, to which I say, "Why the hell are you on this show, you sleazy hypocritical bastard?" Don't try to pretend she's not your type, 20 Pack. If you're willing to appear on "I Love Money," you have no standards.

Besides that, Angelique is attractive, in a strange and unsettling way.

Bonez gets to spend some "one-on-one" time with Angelique, during which he makes his case that his alliance is better than the one she's currently in. He shows her a list that Tailor Made has created, purportedly showing everyone in his alliance ("lion," as Angelique calls it), and therefore the strength in numbers. Angelique is surprised to Cali's name on the list, and frankly I surprised to hear that Cali was still on the show, since she barely registers.

There's some drama surrounding Cali, in which she insists that she's solidly in the ranks of the Frank the Entertainer's army. Why anyone would want to continue on with that loud, buffoonish clown is beyond me, but that's one of the great things about this show:

People on it do not act rationally. They do not act logically. Put another way, they act ridiculously.



Frank the Entertainer yelling illogically about something that makes no sense.

In the end, Angelique decides to keep 20 Pack around even though he does not want to hook up with her. In fact, he finds her physically repulsive. His loss, but she gets some measure of revenge by forcing him to kiss her before giving him his check. Next, there's some suspense as it looks like Bonez, who starts the elimination ceremony with a heartfelt speech about integrity versus negativity (and I think he said that some of the contestants were being "evil"), might get his check. But Angelique follows the Entertainer's script, and it's Becky Buckwild who is once again spared elimination.

Buckwild says something about Angelique's lips and chest being "fake" (by the way, I hate it when people say that breasts that have been surgically enhanced are "fake." they are not fake, they are real. they've just been enhanced) but her spirit being "real," or something like that, and then Becky Buckwild literally kisses Angelique's ass.

Which should answer anyone's question as to why this is such a great show.


Fake money in his hands, but apparently a genuinely nice guy. For what good it did him.

Poor, tragic Bonez is sent home, which prompts Tailor Made to salute his loyalty for "taking one for the team." From his expression, Tailor Made could be talking about a soldier falling on a grenade- it is that serious.

Oh, I cannot wait for next week.

Related, and very exciting news: Megan, who should have won last season's "I Love Money," is getting her own reality show, in which she will search for someone to marry:

Looking for the ultimate TROPHY WIFE?

Reality TV Star and Playboy Cybergirl
MEGAN HAUSERMAN is looking for a man who will shower her with LOVE and MONEY.

VH1 is casting SINGLE MEN of the HIGHEST PEDIGREE to compete for the bikini clad bombshell from ROCK OF LOVE 2, CHARM SCHOOL and I LOVE MONEY.

If you are a single man with the net worth of $1,000,000 or more, then Megan would love to meet you.

Whether you are a CEO or a TRUST FUND BABY, Megan would make the perfect arm candy for any man…who can afford her!

Please email your:

* Name
* Age
* Occupation
* Net Worth
* Contact Number
* Email
* And a short bio to…

TrophyWife@RealTalentCasting.com.

Naturally, I've already sent my submission.

Coming to Tommy's Defense on Tool Academy

Tool Academy was a great show on VH1 in which a group of obnoxious, arrogant "alpha males" are tricked into attending a "school" that is supposed to teach them how to be less of a tool. The finale was last week, in which the "Tiny Tool," an avid bowler, won the $100K prize. If you didn't watch it then don't ask, you'll never understand.

This week was the "reunion" show. I usually don't watch those, but I was curious about these characters because well I just was, don't ask me to explain it. Some of them are just so rotten, you can't look away.

The rottenest couple of all was Tommy and Krista. Much was made of the fact that Tommy was perennially unemployed (he was called "The Slacker Tool") and that Krista was the responsible one, supporting him. In the first episode we learned that Krista, who has two children with another man, was using her ex's child support payments to support Tommy.

VH1 TV Shows | Music Videos | Celebrity Photos | News & Gossip

"He's living off of my child support... which is to support my children" (3:05 in)

And she is the responsible one. (Isn't it illegal to use child support payments for anything other than a child's expenses? Apparently not.

In most states, however, the money may be spent on whatever the custodial parent wants. In those instances, there is little recourse available to the non-custodial parent to challenge the expenditures.

Hopefully some enterprising lawyer will see this clip of a woman admitting on national television that she uses her child support money to support her deadbeat boyfriend and work on getting those laws changed. If I were the father of Krista's kids I would be one exceptionally angry young and good looking man with excellent hair.)


Krista and Tommy, in happier times.

Anyway, on the reunion episode, Krista claimed that she read on the one of the VH1 blogs that several women have claimed to have "hooked up" with Tommy at his new bartending job. She says that the blog postings contained information about Tommy's "junk" that only someone who had been in that area would know. She then goes on to tell everyone just what that detail is.

So, she says, she wants Tommy to take a lie detector test.

Fine. After the show, right? Nope, a lie detector is brought out right there, and Tommy allows himself to be hooked up to it, and a test is administered. On television, in front of a loud studio audience. In front of the other tools, and their mates.

The results, we're told by the eminently qualified polygraph operator, show that Tommy's answers either indicated "deception" or were "inconclusive." At that point, Krista walks away disgusted, and the cameras follow Tommy as he tries to plead his case, insisting he did not cheat, that he loves her, and still wants to try to work things out. It goes on for an interminable period of time- in fact it goes on for so long that it starts to get shall we say uncomfortable to watch.

Tommy is a tool, but so is Krista, and he should count himself lucky to be rid of her, and they should both move on. But Tommy was blindsided and taken advantage of. Lie detectors are unreliable. There is plenty of research that says so:

Studies have long shown that polygraphs are remarkably unreliable, particularly for screening job applicants. As early as 1965, a congressional committee concluded that there was no evidence to support the polygraph's validity; a 1997 survey in the Journal of Applied Psychology put the test's accuracy rate at only 61 percent. Polygraph evidence is generally inadmissible in court because, as Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas noted in his majority opinion in the 1998 case U.S. v. Scheffer, "there is simply no consensus that polygraph evidence is reliable." Indeed, the lie detector is so untrustworthy that Congress passed the Employee Polygraph Protection Act in 1988, making it illegal for private-sector employers to compel workers to take polygraph exams. Prior to the law's passage, according to Senate testimony, an estimated 400,000 workers suffered adverse consequences each year after they were wrongly flunked on polygraphs.

Without question, lie detector tests are controversial. Putting aside their utility as interrogation devices, the validity of their results depends on a lot of things being done right -- the right control questions, the right neutral questions, the right core questions, the right interpretation of the graphs, the right setting for the questioning, and so on. And not all scientific evaluations have concluded that they are accurate even when everything is done right.

The accuracy of polygraph tests is a matter of considerable controversy. While some claim the test to be accurate in 70% - 90% of the cases, critics charge that rather than a "test", the method amounts to an inherently unstandardizable interrogation technique whose accuracy cannot be established. Polygraph tests have also been criticized for failing to catch actual spies such as Aldrich Ames, who passed two polygraph tests while spying for the Russians.

The dirty little secret behind the polygraph is that the "test" depends on trickery, not science. The person being "tested" is not supposed to know that while the polygraph operator declares that all questions must be answered truthfully, warning that the slightest hint of deception will be detected, he secretly assumes that denials in response to certain questions -- called "control" questions -- will be less than truthful. An example of a commonly used control question is, "Did you ever lie to get out of trouble?" The polygrapher steers the examinee into a denial by warning, for example, that anyone who would do so is the same kind of person who would commit the kind of behavior that is under investigation and then lie about it. But secretly, it is assumed that everyone has lied to get out of trouble.

I could go on, but I don't feel like coming to Tommy's defense anymore. He should have stood up for himself and said "Polygraph tests are pseudoscientific BS and I won't submit to one, especially not under these incredibly stressful circumstances when my adrenaline is pumping and my heart is racing anyway," or something like that. I also suspect he's better off without Krista who, as I've already pointed out, is even more of a tool than he could ever hope to be- for using child support money to pay for her boyfriend. What a rotten hypocrite.

Someone needs to think of the children!

Tyra Banks Causes a Riot- I Hope they Had Cameras

A fight broke out while people were waiting to audition for the next season of "America's Next Top Model."

Police didn't know what prompted the chaos involving hundreds of people outside the Park Central New York hotel in Manhattan. The panic left the street outside the hotel littered with shoes and clothing, according to news reports.

I can tell you what prompted the chaos- the chance to be on television with the imminently fierce Tyra Banks is what prompted the chaos. I'm surprised this doesn't happen at every single event at which Tyra appears or might appear, or is rumored to have once appeared, or where someone who has actually seen Tyra in person might appear, or where anyone has even heard of Tyra Banks.

I hope someone thought to have cameras on the people who were waiting to audition. Most people save the rioting for the show.

Note to producers: Just cast everyone involved in the fight and be done with it. Highest-rated season ever.

Banks has said she created the show to counter stereotypes about beauty, and Saturday's auditions were open only to women no taller than 5-foot-7, which is shorter than the industry's conventions.

I've said it before, but it bears repeating: Short women is crazy women.



Update: Via the always remarkable TMZ, footage:

In the end, everyone went home and threw up...you know, because they were so shaken from the incident.

I really love TMZ.

Watchmen: Warner Brothers' Sacrifice to the Fanboys

Watchmen had a pretty good opening last weekend, but has dropped off considerably this weekend, barely beating the remake of "Last House on the Left." The fanboys all went out on opening weekend, were lukewarm about what they saw (giving it a CinemaScore grade of B), and are now waiting for the "director's cut" dvd (three hours and ten minutes- just what the movie was missing- more minutes!) which will probably be released some time this summer.

It's possible the movie will make a huge profit on dvd, and might become a "classic" as some people are suggesting, its reputation growing despite the fact that the general public "didn't get" this "artsy" movie. Or, it might end up like "Mystery Men," a movie that I greatly enjoyed when I saw it in the theaters and expected to catch on on dvd, but of course didn't. In fact, most people I know, fanboys included, are allergic to that movie.

Looking back, it's difficult to understand exactly why Warner Bros, which has done so well with Batman- both artistically and financially- decided to spend $150M on this particular comic book property, when they have access to so much else. Another Superman "reboot." The Flash. Green Lantern. Wonder Woman. Sandman. Plastic Man. I'm sure there are others even more obvious that I'm not thinking of. "Watchmen" is over 20 years old. I first read this issues as they were released when I was 13 and I was over the moon about them. It has a dense, complicated structure that admirably masks its plot holes. It also had lots of sex and violence (for a superhero comic book, anyway). And of course, Dr Manhattan's pecker. It is admired by comic book fans but not well-known outside of that small (and rapidly shrinking) group of people.

It only makes sense that for whatever reason Warners wanted to thank the fanboys by giving them a slavishly faithful adaptation of the comics industry's "War and Peace". As a "thank you" for providing the movie industry with the only really reliable source of hit films right now- comic books.

As Alan Moore has suggested, comics should not be storyboards for movies. Zack Snyder's previous comic book adaptation, "300," worked as well as it did because the source material was a bare-bones story about a fight. That was basically it. "Watchmen" has at least six main characters and almost all of them have complicated backstories set against a mystery involving attacks on them, in a fully-realized alternate reality.

The comic book is structured like a comic book. And Snyder basically used the comic book as a storyboard. Sometimes it worked fairly well, but mostly it didn't. I remember in the original book how much I loved the scene in which Laurie and Jon are having sex, and he replicates himself so that she can have a three-way or a four-way with him. That scene that felt so fresh and unique on the page was dull and lifeless on the screen. A comic book's images don't move, while motion pictures do- that's why the word "motion" is in there. And as either Alejandro Jodorowsky and/or Will Eisner have pointed out (sorry I can't find the quote to link to) comic books are not movies. They seek to create an illusion of movement within a static frame. The rules of pacing and structure are inherently different.

The movie felt listless, as if it were trying to hit everything in the book as quickly as possible and just get to the ending.

And then there's the ending. It was always the weakest part of the book. Even when I was reading the original issues I wondered why anyone would think that would work.

[SPOILER ALERT]
A vagiant cthulu squid teleports into New York, destroying buildings, killing people and driving the survivors mad with some kind of psychic attack is somehow supposed to bring about world peace? Wouldn't it be even more likely to start a massive, worldwide war, as these rival countries (many of whom have leaders who think the end of days is coming) sought to assert their way of thinking on the rest of the world before the rest of the alien invaders come? I forgave it because it was so compellingly rendered in the book. Dave Gibbons' illustrations sold it, and yeah, maybe it seemed a little naive to me but what did I know?

But the new ending, in which Dr Manhattan is framed for the attacks, makes even less sense, and would be more likely to cause an even bigger war. Dr Manhattan was an American. He was given shelter by the American government for years, and single-handedly won the war in Vietnam. So if the rest of the world believes he's gone crazy and attacked multiple cities at once, why for crying out loud wouldn't every other country in the world gang up on America?

And who the hell is Ozymandias to make the decision?

And why, in a nearly three hour movie, do we get multiple scenes with Richard Nixon, but none with his Russian counterpart?

And why did Dr Manhattan have to kill Rorshach? I understand it from a thematic perspective, but storywise it makes no sense. He's a paranoid crackpot- who would believe him?
[SPOILER OVER]

Anyway, the fanboys got the movie they wanted, an almost shot-for-shot remake of the original graphic novel, and very few people outside of the fanboys even care.

The movie is interesting to look at, and the actors all did a pretty decent job (although it was distracting that Dr Manhattan spoke with the same voice as the "for everything else, there's MasterCard" guy). Billy Crudup and Jackie Earl Haley are all getting high marks from critics and fans, and deservedly so, but I think that Patrick Wilson deserves some credit, too. He's been good in "Little Children," "Lakeview Terrace," and now this. He's a good looking guy- resembling a former high-school athlete whose best days are behind him, so he carries with him a hint of sadness. It works as Nite-Owl.

There's a lot to admire, but I don't think I would have understood what was going on without having read the original source material, which is deadly for a movie. It was almost like watching Cliff's Notes.

But the comic book movies that do well do not stick so closely to the original source material, and now that "Watchmen" is going to struggle to get to $100M domestic, it seems unlikely that a major studio is going to spend very much money to make another such adaptation.

Doesn't Actor/Comedian Eddie Izzard Look Suspiciously Like Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano?

I recently found myself in Chicago, staying at a hotel where I received a complimentary copy of USAToday, a ridiculous little newspaper that I honestly didn't think existed anymore. I was excited when I saw on the front page a story about actor/comedian Eddie Izzard, a performer whose work I admire greatly. However, on closer examination, the photo I thought was of Mr Izzard was in fact Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. Naturally my eyes glazed over and I stopped reading, and started thinking about "the BC/AD changeover."



I've never seen the two of them together.

Project Child-Murdering Robot

I redrew it.

Lotto Lend- A New Service That Lends Money to People so They Can Buy Lottery Tickets

This is the height of irresponsibility and I for one am absolutely OUTRAGED by it! Loaning people money to play their state lotteries is ludicrous. We should be encouraging people to behave responsibly, not just spending money willy-nilly in the hopes that maybe their numbers will come up.

I'm so OUTRAGED!

Photo swiped from here.

"I Love Money 2" is the Greatest Television Show of All Time

It just is.

It is difficult to put into words exactly how movingly wonderful is the experience of watching I Love Money 2. In most reality programs, the participants at least superficially act in logical ways- or at the very least in their own best interests. If for no other reason than that they want to "win" the game, and the cash prize at the end. Not so the contestants of "I Love Money." Their actions are so bizarre, so thoroughly divorced from logic and reason that watching them produces a sort of ecstatic delight at the sheer mind-boggling number of possible scenarios presented in each episode.

If you've never seen it, I pity you, and envy you. Please track down the episodes and watch, no scratch that, savor them. No synopsis can do justice to the delights that come from watching these people. But I'll give it a shot.

Basically, the show brings together participants ("characters") from the VH1 "Of Love" shows: "Flavor of Love," "I Love New York," and "Rock of Love," places those characters in a large resort home in Mexico, plies them with tequila and other adult beverages, and turns them loose on each other. Yes, there's a structure, as the characters are divided up into teams, and are given challenges, with a member of the losing team being voted out, but the structure is almost irrelevant to the proceedings. That's been done before. It's how the characters interact with one another that makes the show.

In the end, the "winner" gets $250,000.00. But the way these people behave, you wouldn't know it. These people are-- well, they're not stupid. They just do not behave in any logical way.


Frank the Entertainer is the least logical (and loudest) of an illogical (and loud) bunch.

In the most recent episode (today, March 9), the remaining contestants, divided into a green team and a gold team, were pitted against each other in a challenge that involved three team members building a catapult that would fling chickens that would be caught by the remaining team members. The gold team performed pathetically, barely able to construct their catapult, and, once built, only managing to get a few chickens airborne (some of the chickens even flew backwards). The green team managed to get their five chickens thrown and caught, no problem. The captain of the green team, a slightly moronic but ultimately lovable brute called Frank "The Entertainer" caught all the chickens himself, gloating all the while that "someone (from the yellow team) is going home!"

As the captain of the winning team, he is given the opportunity to decide which member of the losing, yellow, team, will be sent home. If you have not seen either this show, or "I Love Money 1", or "I Love New York," then it will difficult to understand this character. He is the perfect example of the arrested alpha male- constantly yelling and gloating about his elevated position among the other characters on the show, all the while never letting anyone forget that he needs the money to "move out of my parents' basement." Yes, this figure of menace who believes he's in charge of everything that goes on in the house still lives with his parents. It's unclear if he has a job at all.

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In fact, I don't think any of these people have "jobs" in any real sense; my suspicion is that they are simply "reality stars," and spend their time making personal appearances and serving as escorts. Buckwild might actually be a stand-up comedian, if her myspace page can be believed. Also this.

Anyway. The yellow team must enter "The Vault" and decide which three of them will be placed at The Entertainer's mercy. One of them will be sent home, which is ignominious in itself- but being sent home by The Entertainer is doubly humiliating.

Frank is in an alliance with five or six other people across both teams. He fully expects, given his firm, some might say delusional, belief that he is in control, that the yellow team will send three people that he opposes for possible elimination. It's almost charming how completely clueless this man is.

Instead, another alliance has formed, and only the most dim-witted could not have seen this. The leader of this new alliance is a character called "Tailor Made," who apparently "won" the most recent series of "I Love New York." Somehow, his romance with New York did not last. Anyway. Tailor Made has convinced four members of the yellow team to vote out The Entertainer's compatriots, "20 Pack," "Heat," and "Becky Buckwild" (all characters have clever nicknames earned on their previous VH1 reality series). These three cannot believe it. They've been outsmarted, which is no small feat. Their reactions are beautiful; full of confused anger that leaves the viewer feeling simultaneously sorry for them, and delighted at their predicament.

Tailor Made's reaction is priceless, too. He manages to barely conceal a smug smile- he should win the show for his self-control alone. The man has orchestrated a coup, and almost single-handedly turned the momentum of the game.

But, as I've said, one of the delights of this game is its unpredictability. These people do not think with their brains.


Tailor Made is the least stupid person on a show full of- well, people who don't think too good.

Now, a thoroughly dejected and miserable Entertainer must choose from amongst his three compatriots (actually, two, since he has no intention of sending home Becky Buckwild, given the fact that she has been "feeling him up lately," and kissing him in bed. it's hilarious the way the other two, Heat and 20 Pack, just accept this. Entertainer even says at one point that 20 Pack and Heat are the only two people he can "100% trust in this game," but it never occurs to him to eliminate Buckwild- so much for "bros before hos"). Heat is so depressed, in fact, that he starts drinking even before the "power outing," during which Entertainer will spend time with the three of them, deciding which to send home.

It's during the Power Outing that the Entertainer shows a glimmer of intelligence, positing that perhaps the yellow team's pathetic display in the chicken-chucking challenge might have been deliberate, so as to put the Entertainer in a position to have to eliminate members of his own alliance. At this point we're treated to some delightful footage showing that in fact that was Tailor Made's plan all along.

Heat, even more saddened and confused, seems about to cry, slurring his words, promising to give everything for the game, but vowing not to be angry at The Entertainer should he decide to eliminate him, then railing against the "snakes and scumbags, and they all begin with s" who "betrayded" him.

If it weren't so hilarious, I'd feel bad for him.

In another bit of knife-twisting, we learn that the waiter who served the drinks on the Power Outing was the same waiter- Heat recognizes him through the blurry drunken haze in which he now finds himself- who served him drinks in the Power Outing he had with the Entertainer in season 1 of "I Love Money" (yes, these two have some back to play again, and yes, neither seems to have learned anything from the experience). It was right after that Power Outing that the Entertainer eliminated Heat.


Tragic, two-time loser Heat. Someone should probably have him on a suicide watch.

And of course, The Entertainer ends up doing it again. He cops out and has his team vote, and they ultimately decide to send Heat home. It's hard to imagine anything that could be worse.








Four looks for Becky Buckwild, stand-up comic and VH1 reality show contestant. Also probably available for weddings and bar mitzvahs.

Not Buckwild. Never even crosses his mind. And I have to admit, it probably wouldn't cross my mind, either. She manages to be hot, strange, and cartoonish all at the same time. That's a rare combination in a woman, even a reality show character.

Anyway. Sorry, I think Buckwild kind of hypnotized me for a moment. Really, the pictures don't do her justice. She talks like a character from the film Idiocracy- a sort of mixture of urban and rural slang, in a mildly irritating voice that careens between screech and howl. I'll leave it to the reader to seek out the show, if he hasn't already. In any other show I'd say she doesn't stand a chance, but with this group, she just might win the whole thing.

Is Having No Religion the Same as Being an Atheist?

Something called The Program on Public Values at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut has released a study that is confusingly covered in a particularly-poorly-worded article released by the AP (the name of the group who did the study, and their methods, aren't even mentioned until the ninth paragraph).

In the second paragraph we learn:

Fifteen percent of respondents said they had no religion, an increase from 14.2 percent in 2001 and 8.2 percent in 1990, according to the American Religious Identification Survey.

That's good news. 15% don't follow any religion. I'm happy to read that. Not as happy as I'd be if it said 100%, but then again, I'm a total crackpot.

However, later in the story (eleventh paragraph), we get this:

About 12 percent of Americans believe in a higher power but not the personal God at the core of monotheistic faiths.

Are those 12% who believe in a "higher power" (whatever in the hell that vague and useless term is supposed to mean) part of the 15% mentioned in the second paragraph who don't follow any religion? If so, I don't understand the distinction between "not following any religion" and "not believing in a 'higher power'." Isn't the idea of a higher power central to every religion?

Or, maybe some of the 76% who consider themselves "Christian" fall into the "higher power" group? The article doesn't say because, as I've mentioned above, it's poorly-worded.

I'm getting a headache from this. And I thought it was supposed to be good news.

From the article, we learn that

76% consider themselves Christian.
15% no religion.
1.2% part of new religious movements, including Scientology, Wicca and Santeria.
1.2% Jewish (really? As many Jewish as Scientologists, Wiccans and Santerians? [combined]?)
0.6% Muslim

That doesn't add up to 100%. Maybe I missed something in the article. What about the other people?

Damn, this is a stupid article.

This on the same day that "60 Minutes" in New Zealand just released a video of their segment on my favorite "pastor," Ray Comfort of Living Waters/Way of the Master. It is what I believe is known in journalism circles as a "puff piece."

More irritating is this nonsense from the United Nations.

And then there's this from the great state of Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down etc- an attempt to make Richard Dawkins illegal. That's almost as stupid as trying to legislate the value of pi.

And as if that weren't enough, daylight savings time started this weekend.

Argh.

Gosh, I was so happy at the beginning of this post. Now look at me. I need a nap.

William Shakespeare Portrait

Scholars studying the life and times of William Shakespeare unveiled a portrait Monday believed to be the only authentic image of the Bard painted during his lifetime.

Reading the article and seeing the portrait reminded me just how lucky we are that we live in an age in which we have instant access to images of just about everyone we can imagine, be it on facebook or YouTube, or television.* For instance, I had no trouble at all finding images of today's Shakespeare, the playwright and actor Tyler Perry:



Both were playwrights and actors, both achieved wild success in their own lifetimes, and both were men who played female characters on stage.

*I'm also happy that, so far at least, I haven't had to worry about the plague, or the use of leeches as medical treatment, or baptismal syringes.

It Could Have Been Worse

There is a baseball player called Alex Rodriguez who has been much in the news lately, for admitting to taking steroids during the 2001-2003 baseball seasons.

Now there's a story that he will miss six to nine weeks after having surgery on his hip.

[Dr. Marc] Philippon is confident in the “85-90 pecent range” that Rodriguez will be able to play through the entire regular season.

“I firmly believe this approach will be successful and allow Alex to return,” Philippon said. “We’ve had very good success with this approach. Short term, we feel the risk is very limited that he will re-tear his labrum during that six-, seven-month period.”

The decision eliminates the option of Rodriguez treating the injury with rest and rehab and playing through the season without surgery. This operation will not completely correct the hip. More aggressive surgery would have sidelined Rodriguez three to four months.

We already know that Rodriguez has used steroids in the past. And we know that steroids help speed up recovery time. So would his hip injury have been worse if Rodriguez hadn't used steroids? Wasn't his use just a way of helping the owners of baseball teams protect their massive investment in him? The way it is now, because of his physical condition, he's not going to miss any of the "regular season", or miss very little of it. The Yankees will not be without his services for too long, and will probably go on to win all the big games.

Maybe that's why his teammates attended the press conference he held? They were thanking him.

A Comic Seeking to Explain Why it is That Things I Don't Like are Popular

What drives marketing teams to promote the things they do? Could it be that the reason that things I don't like are so popular is that those things are being pushed by people who have been unable to get over their ex-girlfriends? I suppose it's possible; otherwise I probably wouldn't have created this comic.

Michael Jackson Press Conference is like a Tim & Eric Awesome Show sketch

Michael Jackson is going on tour for nine or ten, or possibly as many as 20 or more, shows in Europe.

Here's the silly press conference video. He looks like he's standing in front of a green screen, with the red curtain put in "in post". And the way it keeps cutting back to the "screaming fans" (literally, there appear to be dozens of them!) is just cheesy and unconvincing. I don't think they were actually there- they were probably filmed somewhere else, perhaps in line for "New Kids on the Block" tickets.



Really, who told him this looked cool or exciting? It just looks sad, and without any self-awareness; sort of like the sketches they do on "Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!" on Adult Swim.

Except Tim and Eric is funny on purpose.

Exclusive! I Have the Octomom's Birth Tape!

TMZ is claiming that Nadya Suleman, the "Octomom," is shopping a video of the birth of her octuplets- for SEVEN FIGURES! (Why not 8 figures, by the way? Doesn't that make more sense?)

Well, I have the footage right here, you can watch it for free:



Or if YouTube takes it down:

Octuplets! - watch more funny videos

Eff You, "No Cussing Week", and the Little Scold Who Created You, Too

According to this story, some 15 year old scold has convinced the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors to issue a proclamation naming the first week of March as "No Cussing Week."

Not that 15-year-old [McKay] Hatch expects complete compliance. When his No Cussing Club meets at South Pasadena High School on Wednesdays it's not unusual for a nonmember to throw open the door and fire off a torrent of four-letter words. He's also been the target of organized harassment by pro-cussers.

I am opposed to harassment, but I wonder what this little scold's definition of "harassment" is. Is just hearing the "cuss words" harassment? And how "organized" is it? Do the pro-cussers have their own club, too? Somehow I doubt that people who don't have hang-ups about artificially created taboos regarding the sounds that emanate from peoples' mouths have time to start little "clubs" to promote their cause.

And Antonovich's county motion carries no penalties.

"But it's a good reminder for all of us, not just young people but everybody, to be respectful to one another and watch the words we use," said the supervisor's spokesman, Tony Bell.

It can't carry any penalties because one of our most cherished rights is the right to free speech. It's so important, in fact, that it is embodied within the first amendment to the US Constitution. Has this little 15 year-old scolding squirt ever heard of the Constitution?

(And why, by the way, does the use of "cuss words" somehow automatically denote a lack of respect? Isn't it more respectful to accept that there are people who use colorful language to express themselves? It's disrespectful to language to refuse to use some words just because you think they're "dirty.")

"Next year I want to try to get California to have a cuss-free week. And then, who knows, maybe worldwide," said the 10th grader, who believes if people treat each other with more civility they can better work together to solve bigger problems.

Yes, if only we didn't use foul language, all the wars would be over, and we could get down to the real business of solving our bigger problems. Like for instance all of the crap that Los Angeles and California are dealing with right now.

The kid is a little scold, but the LA County Board of Supervisors should be ashamed of themselves for encouraging him in his morally retarded crusade. They are worse.

He formed the No Cussing Club and invited others to join. Soon the group had a Web site, bright orange T-shirts, a hip hop theme song and inquiries from all over from people interested in joining. He estimates 20,000 people have formed similar clubs.

"It's not about forcing anyone to stop, just to bring awareness," he says of the movement. "If you can do a week without cussing, maybe you can do two weeks. And then maybe a month."

Where does he get his "20,000" number? The genius from the Associated Press who wrote the article doesn't say. Nor does he explain why the kid's "No Cussing Week" isn't about forcing anyone to stop, then proceeds to explain, in the very next sentence, how he wants to force people to stop. And let us not forget that, in fact, people have recently been arrested for cursing.

Eff him. Eff the LA County "Board of Supervisors."

Bonus: "F Word" video. Not safe for work:

Re: Daddy Eats Dead Cows- The Dangers of Moral Retardation

There is an endlessly annoying article on Slate called "Daddy Eats Dead Cows," in which the author, who is not a vegetarian, describes the plight of living with a humorless vegetarian wife and two daughters that they have decided ("together"!) to raise as vegetarians.

I do not have a problem with vegetarians. Some of my best friends and relatives are vegetarians. What I do have is a problem with pompous scolds who believe that their way of doing things is the best and indeed only proper way, and anyone who disagrees with them is an uncivilized brute who doesn't care about anything or anyone else.

For example, what will we do when the girls have social events that don't include parents? Someday soon, they will be going out for pizza with their friends, and Cyd and I won't be there to order the veggie toppings. Will they be permitted to order meat? Obviously, they'll do what they want, but if what they want is to eat meat, will they have to hide it from us?

Cyd has a stock answer to this question: "When they're old enough," she says, "to explain that they know the animal has been murdered and that they want to eat the murdered animal anyway, then they'll be permitted to do so." She's kidding about the language (I think), but she's dead serious about the principle. Only when they're old enough to understand the ethical question will they be permitted to answer it for themselves.

He only thinks she's kidding about the language? This is his wife and the mother of his two little vegetarian sweethearts; he should know whether she is or not. I assume that this person wouldn't marry someone who still eats meat (he's just not allowed to keep any meat in the house) if she truly considered meat to be "murder," which is to say the moral equivalent of killing a human being. But why even phrase it like that, especially if it's your "stock answer"? Could you imagine being with a life partner who said, even jokingly, that you were a "murderer" as part of a "stock answer" to a question about your childrens' upbringing? That must be one hell of a fun household.

Besides that, why is vegetarianism the default position for this family? Don't they want to expose their children to as many positive experiences as possible? Believe me, your first taste of foie gras is life-changing. That is the most wonderful flavor sensation in the world. Imagine living your life without tasting tripe, tongue, marrow, ox tails, or pork rinds? They're trying to force their children into a lifestyle that one of them has browbeaten the other into believing is morally superior, while limiting their childrens' experiences.

In asking my vegetarian friends, however, I have found that children raised as vegetarians tend to accept vegetarianism as a fact of life. I shouldn't have been surprised, really: We all think that what we ate as young children was the best food in the world; it's only with some effort that we introduce radical changes to our diet. Vegetarianism comes easily to those who have never known otherwise.

Good for them. I'm all for raising children to be vegetarians, if that's what you're into. You have to do what you think is best for your child. I'm not opposed, at least not in theory, to raising children to be religious, either.

But I am opposed to raising children to be intolerant morally retarded scolds who think they're better than everyone else.

I figure that the only good reason to be a vegetarian is that it's morally right—otherwise, why bother? Brisket tastes good! Lox tastes good! But I spoke with one vegetarian mom who discourages her children from thinking of vegetarianism in terms of animal rights. Hilary Cruz-Abrams, a friend of a friend, lives in New York, where she and her husband are raising three vegetarian children "for health reasons." The eldest, a 6-year-old daughter, has asked her why the family doesn't eat meat. "And we've been very clear with her that it's not unkind, that it's not someone committing an evil act," Hilary says. "We talk about cavemen"—how they had to eat meat to survive.

So you see, meat-eaters are just unevolved "cavemen" who aren't as civilized and enlightened as we are. Can you imagine being around the children in that family? They're going to think that anyone who enjoys the flavor of a foie gras and kobe beef hamburger is a slow-witted moron to be pitied. (Like for instance, you know, Anthony Bourdain and Michael Ruhlman.) Why is that better than framing the argument as one of "animal rights"?

By the way, does the author really believe that the only good reason to be a vegetarian is that it's "morally-right"? There is plenty of evidence that a vegetarian diet is quite healthy indeed.

But one of the beautiful things about children, of course, is their hyperactive and keenly felt sense of justice, which easily outstrips their parents'. (Ask anyone who has watched Bambi or Old Yeller with a room of children.) No matter the parents' reasons for vegetarianism, children whose consciences have been pricked are likely to find their way to animal rights; it's a better sell than "the environment" or "your health"—and for good reason. Hilary admits that her daughter's vegetarianism includes "a sensibility of 'That was a cow? I like cows. That seems unkind.' " My friend Carole, mother of two vegetarian daughters, thinks that killing animals is wrong, but she worried when her girls got a bit too drunk on the message. "It was important to us that we not teach them that vegetarianism is superior and that people who eat meat are bad," Carole told me. "But at some point when they were very young, they became militant vegetarians. When Sarah was around 3, they became quite outspoken about how meat was disgusting, and we told them to tone it down and let people eat what they want."

Can we please, please, please retire the worn-out cliche about kids having a greater sense of fair-play and justice than adults? (And what in the hell do those horrible films "Bambi" and "Old Yeller" have to do with anything? I worry about any child who can sit through that nonsense at all.) Children are the future and they're great and all that, but they are venal, cruel, bullying little leaches who require guidance from human adults in order to learn not to be so absolutely vile in their behavior.

I think that what people really mean in this context is that children are more impressionable. The kids take the mother's "joking" militance and the father's half-hearted mealy-mouthed impressions that eating meat is bad, and they run with it. They become "outspoken," and "militant." The adults see in their little sweethearts the very thing that they wish they could be. It's no different than those parents who push their children into playing sports. They're trying to live vicariously through them- to see them become the militant full-on vegetarians-for-life that they wished they could be.

Indeed, the author says as much early in his essay:

From the time we met, I admired Cyd's commitment to vegetarianism. I had taken baby-steps toward vegetarianism myself: After reading Peter Singer's Animal Liberation in my mid-20s, I had given up chicken, which seemed to me the most cruelly abused of all the factory-farmed animals. Yet when, during our courtship, Cyd said that having a vegetarian household, and doing our best to raise vegetarian children, was important to her, I hesitated (or, rather, picked a long, loud fight).

He admires the full-on commitment to the vegetarian lifestyle that he himself failed to achieve. So he's letting her decide what the kids eat- and hopefully those kids will succeed where he failed. He admires it so much that he totally capitulated to her on one of the most important aspects of their child-rearing.

By the way- the vegetarian wife got to decide on their daughters' diet. What did he get to decide on?