We'll Inherit the Earth, Praise the Lord!

I watched Saved! last night. It was pretty decent, but I really enjoyed one of the inside jokes. At the climax of the movie -- the big prom scene -- they opened the shot with a Christian band named God's Plan lip syncing the song 'We'll Inherit the Earth'. It sounds kind of Jesus-ey, but the funny thing is that it's not a real Christian band, nor is it a Christian song. They actually playing The Replacements (We'll inherit the earth, but we don't want it... it's been ours since birth, so whatch doin' onit?). Then, in the next scene -- the touching scene -- they play The Replacements' "Skyway" in the background.

I suspect this was a little nod put in by the movie's producer, Michael Stipe (of R.E.M.) They even give Paul Westerberg a 'special thanks' in the credits, so it's obviously intentional.

Now, if it were ME, I would have picked the song "Can't Hardly Wait" for the big prom scene, since it would be a perfect fit for the theme of the movie, plus it features one of my favorite Westerberg lines -- "Je-sus rides be-siiiide me... he never... buuuuys an-ny smoooookes..." That would have been a lot funnier. Oh, and I would have used "Sixteen Blue" instead of "Skyway", but that's just me.

Oh well, it still cracked me up.

There are at least a couple of other Westerberg movie nods that I can think of. In the the movie Heathers, the name of the high school is Westerberg High. Winona Ryder was a big Replacements fan at the time, and not surprisingly, she and Westerberg became an 'item' shortly thereafter. And the movie Can't Hardly Wait -- guess where the title comes from?

Anyway, that's my last Westerberg post for the year. I'm sure you're all relieved.

Oh, one last thing. Today is Paul Westerberg's birthday, so Happy Birthday Paul!

Nice little movie clip: A little girl gets a record player and is introduced to the Sex Pistols. She becomes a fan of music in general. A fan of music... yes!

And finally, just to waste away the rest of your day -- the uber-fantastic Fimoculous list of best/worst lists of 2004. That should keep you busy for a while.

Have a Happy New Year!

Why shopping online is better.

Yesterday I ventured out to the mall to see if I could nab any good deals before the end of the year. After an hour, I was wondering, "and why didn't I just do this on Amazon?..."

First, the only thing I really wanted to get was mittens. I have several pairs of gloves, but I don't like gloves on the really cold days. At the dog park, for instance, I normally end up balling my hands into fists and capping them with the gloves, which gives me that earth-destroying robot look. I figure mittens would be more practical. Right?

But, what I learned is that they don't make mittens for men anymore. Maybe they exist somewhere, but I couldn't seem to find any. I had to settle on an XL pair of women's mittens before shamefully checking out. Are mittens now considered unmasculine?

Then, I went over to Marshall Fields and did some browsing. I was checking out some coats when BAM!, I got body checked into a coat rack with a gruff "Hey, watch out!" Scared, I turned only to find one of my old coworkers -- a petite soccer mom -- standing there with her kid, smiling. Nice. Nice example for the kid. Brute!

And this is why I love Amazon.

Here's some conservative Christian's movie review of the Spongebob Squarepants movie. Patrick also displays sexual perversion in the final scene, when he attends a rock concert wearing fishnet stockings and women's black leather boots... David Hasselhoff makes an embarrassing cameo in swim trunks, during which his chest is computer-manipulated so that his pectoral muscles flex unnaturally, even forming a square shape, and then he places SpongeBob and Patrick on his chest and uses his muscles like a wedge to propel them back down into the sea. It is a grotesque scene.

Okay, there is no freakin' way this would ever work: How to use a hand puppet to meet, attract, and date tons of single women... Would it?

The Tao of Kate Bosworth. ON CREATING POSITIVE CHANGE: "It's amazing. Because if you, like, have everybody taking ten minutes a day and really focusing on, like, positivity and a better world and a better self, like, imagine all that, just all that positivity going out there?"

Recommended DVD rental of the week: Venus Beauty Institute.

The Hamtini

Still trying to find ways of getting rid of my Christmas ham, I thought I'd try a suggestion posted here -- the Hamtini.



I about the only good thing about this drink is that it confirmed that my gag reflex is in perfect working order. Yuck! Maybe adding blue curacao wasn't a great idea either, but I thought it gave it a certain panache. Of course, panache only works when viewing the glass. It doesn't fare so well when you try inserting a blue-stained hunk of ham into your mouth.

Next project -- the hamguerita!

Speaking of, Eric Idle is bringing Monty Python & the Holy Grail to broadway in a new musical called Spamalot. Hmmm. And they even got Mike Nichols to direct, and it stars David Hyde Pierce, Time Curry, and Hank Azaria. Who wants to roadtrip to New York with me once this comes out?

Gadget Wars!

Well, the gizmo arms race between my brother and I is heating up again. We have this ongoing challenge-response system of adopting technology. If he gets something new and cool, inevitably I'll have to get one. And if I get something new and cool, my sister-in-law likes me... well, not so much.

So, for Christmas he got a new iMac G5 -- all decked out. Bah!

(I'm getting one for sure sometime this year, but not just yet. I have to wait for them to release the "one better" model, THEN I'll get one).

So, to retaliate, I got the new XM MyFi yesterday. So far it totally rocks. It's supposed to give you portable XM radio access on the go, at home, and in the car. I haven't tried the "on the go" or "in the car" features, but the at home part is smokin'. So far this morning I've listened to Hoagy Carmichael's Stardust, Seinfeld doing a bit on supermarkets, BBC World news, and Nine Inch Nails. Oh yeah... I feel like this is going to be a pleasant addition to my auditory experience.

And here's something interesting. Somebody does an analysis of the puppets of pop, to determine how repetitive the lyrics are, how many times the word 'baby' is used, etc.

Finally the cold snap has broken. Last week we were definitely "Feeling Minnesota". Hard to do much when the high temperature for the day doesn't even break the zero degree mark. Today it's going to be in the 20's, which feels downright balmy.

On Christmas Day, my Mom came over and we went to the Uptown to see A Very Long Engagement. Highly recommend!

Other movies rented recently -- Dodgeball and Mean Girls. Both were pretty awful, so I'm not recommending either. I think a 4th grader wrote the script for Dodgeball. Painful stuff. Using the other side of my brain, I watched Ponette and Beneath the Sand -- both French dramas, and both get a big thumbs up from me. In Ponette, the little girl (who's in -- and carries -- almost every scene) won best actress at the Venice Film Festival. Not bad, considering she was only FOUR YEARS OLD. This was the most unbelievable performance I've seen in a child actor -- ever. Mind boggling. The little girl is clearly a prodigy.

Here's something to keep you busy today. The top 10 e-mail attachments (movies) of 2004.

Top 10 weird news stories of 2004.

Bad Christmas displays.

Dog Judo.

I've still got about 50 lbs. of leftover ham (thanks Mom) in my fridge, which I'll have to subsist on this week. Anybody have any good recipes for leftover ham?

Okay, so somebody actually did more diligent searching for the NY Post article, and found it here, cleverly titled LOVE COULDN'T BE VERSE - MEN MOAN NEW DATING BOOK IS KILLING ROMANCE. (I can't believe I'm in a tabloid)... The abstract reads:

"Um, we all aren't alpha males!" says Brian Lebo, a 36-year-old marketing manager. "I'm short. I'm shy, and I'm from Minnesota. That isn't exactly the trifecta in the dating derby."

For the past few months, Lebo has been nursing a crush on a cute brunette he would see at the dog run. They'd make small talk, and he'd want to ask her out, "But then ...

Unfortunately, to read the whole article, it will cost you $3.50 -- which I don't recommend. Also, for those of you that don't know me, "Brian Lebo" isn't my real name, so don't bother doing any google searches on it. You'll find the home page of a 15-year-old kid in Pennsylvania who's keen on transcribing the bass lines to Papa Roach songs. That's not me. Trust me.

Anyway, if anyone's curious about how the cute brunette story turned out, here's the abbreviated version.

I met a cute brunette at the dog park. Did I ask her out? No. Was I into her? Yes. Would she think I was into her? No (* according to "He's Just Not That Into You").

Why? Read on.

First, let's call her Mallory, since she reminds me of Mallory Keaton from Family Ties (thankfully, not Tina Yothers).

The first time I met Mallory, we seemed to get along quite nicely. Just small talk about the dogs, mostly, and she had a quick, random, easy way of talking. But dog park visits are short. So, as she was leaving that first day, even though I was very interested in knowing more about her, I couldn't bring myself to do anything about it (like ask her out). After all, at this point, I knew absolutely nothing about her. She could be married for all I knew. And as for me? Well, dressed up in my grubbies and carrying around a steaming bag of dog crap? I'm not exactly feeling sexy and confident. So, despite the advice given by Tigertamer Greg Behrendt, who would conclude that "I'm just not that into her", I reasoned that it's better to take some time and let this play out organically. Absolutely crazy talk, I know. But... on with the story.

The investigation starts. Over the course of the next several weeks, I manage gleen a few nuggets of information, such as her first name, and the name of a school where she used to teach. Using Google (a stalker's dream tool), this is enough for me to find her bio at her current employer. Problem #1: Her bio lists her as "Mrs." Not "Ms.", but "Mrs." Married? Bah!

Weeks pass, idle chit-chat, and in the course of our converstations, she keeps mentioning her roommate. Not husband, or ex-husband, or anything like that. A roommate. And then, in a very clever maneuver, I manage to ask a question about the roommate which forces her to answer with a personal pronoun. "My roommate? No, she never takes the dogs up her..." Roommate = she. Not married? Divorced? Separated?

Still more weeks pass, more idle chit-chat, and finally I get a glimpse of her hand sans glove. Specifically, the ring finger. Wedding ring. Hmmm. But where's the husband? He's never been mentioned. Maybe the dude's in Iraq or something?

And finally, the final clue. She tells me that she's a musician with a local orchestra. A-ha! Back to Google -- find the web page of the orchestra -- and there she is, first chair in her section. Awesome! That is, until I go to the about section of the orchestra's page and find out that membership in the orchestra is open to "gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered" musicians.

So there you have it.

In retrospect, it turns out that what I really need is for someone to write a book called, "She's Just Not That Into Men." Now THAT would save me a lot of time.

Drats!

Last week I was contacted by the NY Post to supply some more insights on a piece they were running on He's Just Not That Into You. The story ran over the weekend, but now the link isn't available any more.

It was on how this book is ruining the dating lives of men, so I scrabbled together another rant and they printed a few quotes. Oh well. Probably for the best. I'm not sure I want to come across as the whiny guy who blames a book for ruining his life. I want to come across as the whiny guy who blames Ashton Kutcher for ruining his life.

Last night we did our family Christmas get-together, and wouldn't you know it, both my brother and I forgot our cameras at home (doh!). Anyway, now that my major holiday event is over with (and Christmas shopping now officially done), I can relax and enjoy the rest of this week.

Why write letters to Santa Claus when you can write letters to Christopher Walken instead? Or, at least get letters from Bad Santa.

It's a Wonderful Life in 30 Seconds (re-enacted by bunnies).

My Top 10 Script Ideas of 2004

1. Butte Chaps (screwball comedy) Ashton Kutcher and Ben Affleck star as two would-be horse rustlers who take refuge at a remote Montana dude ranch after a caper goes awry. Little do they know it's an all gay “Dude” Ranch. Think “City Slickers” meets “The Birdcage”.

2. I'm Not Exactly Sure What You Did Last Summer, But If I Know You, And I Think I Do, Then I'll Bet It Was Something Pretty Bad... Pretty Pretty Bad (slacker/horror) Kevin Smith directs this slacker-cum-slasher movie, with a twist. Actually, it's not much of twist. After a few marginally scary scenes, we find out that nobody's been killed. It's just a stoner neighbor who's screwing with Jay and Silent Bob, so they just sit around the apartment and talk about comic books and porn for the rest of the film. Think “Clerks” meets “My Dinner With Andre”.

3. Bitch Away (chick flick) Bette Midler stages a comeback as a frustrated television talk show host who's fed up with self-pitying narcissists. She enlists in the army and becomes the first singing, parachuting Green Beret. Feel the wind beneath her wings, G-Force style. Think “Private Benjamin” meets “Terminal Velocity”.

4. Yo's Mamma (biopic) The riveting story of Yo-Yo Ma's Ma trying to raise a cello prodigy in the South Bronx. Starring Jackie Chan and Eddie Murphy as Yo's Mamma. Think “Boyz 'N Tha Hood” meets “Mr. Holland's Opus”.

5. Finding Nimoy (animated): An endearing story of an introspective nerd (voiced by Billy Bob Thornton) who leaves his parent's basement to attend a Star Trek convention in Pittsburgh. Think “Napoleon Dynamite” meets “Spongebob Squarepants”.

6. It's An Existential Life, Charlie Brown (comedy) Oscar-winner Kevin Spacey tackles the role of the loveable round-headed kid, all growed-up and realizing that his outlook on life has been, all along, a self-fulfilling prophecy. So he becomes a Scientologist. Think “Battlefield Earth” meets “American Beauty”.

7. Wang Chung (porn) Watch the sexy escapades of Maury Povich and his wife as they try out their new video camera, before returning it to the store because they think it's broken. Rated X. Think “Saving Ryan's Privates” meets “Anchorman”.

8. Jesus Is Just Not That Into You (drama) Christopher Walken, in a breakout performance, tells the undeserving faithful the awful truth. “That Footprint poem... Ah... Yes... Well I have news for you... my friend. When you only saw... only one set of footprints... in the sand... I wasn't carrying you... I was playing skee-ball... Truth is... I'm just not that into you.” Think “The Greatest Story Ever Told” meets “The Deer Hunter”.

9. My Big, Fat, Obnoxious Vice-President (documentary) Michael Moore documents his time at Gitmo after challenging Dick Cheney to a beer-chugging contest. Think “Over The Top” meets “Strange Brew”.

10. My Pronto Pup: The Movie (romance) A struggling screenwriter wastes his time at the dog park and posts idiotic messages to his weblog, only to find true love with Demi Moore. Think “You've Got Mail!” meets “Turner & Hooch”.

Oh dear lord, what is wrong with some people? Go on, and try this interactive Christmas Song thing. Ask them to sing "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "Twelve Days of Christmas", like I did, and try not to snort coffee out of your nose.

Also, better than bible dipping or iPod skipping, just Ask Crystal.

Merry Christmas, Dan. Whereas, on or about the night prior to Christmas, there did occur at a certain improved piece of real property (hereinafter "the House") a general lack of stirring by all creatures therein, including, but not limited to a mouse.

What did the Zen basset hound ask the hot dog vendor?

Make me one with everything.

Question du Jour: Since everyone's putting out there "Top 10" lists for 2004, I'm thinking I should try that. Any suggestions? Brian's Top 10 _______ of 2004.

Thanks to everyone for the book suggestions. I went to Barnes & Noble yesterday and stocked up with a massive pile of reading. Here's what I have lined up:

The St. Paul Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter*
The Bug (needed for my book club)
Anna Karenina*
History of Beauty

That's about a billion pages I have to read. Will I have the attention span for it? Highly unlikely, but I'm compulsive about buying books, so I couldn't help myself.

* Oh, and one little nit. Oprah, would you STOP sticking your stupid purple stickers all over the books I want to read? A man shouldn't have to feel emasculated when purchasing a book by Tolstoy, so just knock it off already! And (once again), to the twit working the Barnes & Noble cash register, "No, I don't need a gift receipt. These are for ME. And I'm STILL just not that into you!"

Anyone notice how my crankiness has been really dialed up as of late? Normally that doesn't happen until January. I guess I'm early this year.

New signature iPods.

City Pages' Local Music Yearbook '04. I did pretty good this year. I caught the Guided By Voices show, the Husker Du reunion, and Westerberg's on-stage freak-out. Oh, but they forgot to mention Cyndi Lauper's show at the State Fair. That should have made the list.

Behold! The new Insanity Ride atop the Stratosphere in Vegas. I've done the roller coaster and the tower ride on the Stratosphere, but this looks certifiably insane.

So, who wants to roadtrip to Vegas with me next year?

It might be Monday if...

• You wake up to check e-mail for work, only to find out that your ISP got 'spam-bombed' over night, causing your day's work to be backed up for most of the day.
• Some stupid mutt attacks your dog up at the dog park, causing your whole body to be flooded with a testerone-fueled rage like you wouldn't believe*.
• Your dog (still upset from being attacked) pukes in the back seat of your car on the way home.
• You get home to find out that your automatic garage door opener isn't working anymore. On the coldest day of the year so far.
• You go for a walk dressed up in your Michelin Man outfit (and dress your pup in a blue coat), only to get laughed at by the plump weiner dog lady next door. Laughing. At you. The weiner dog lady.
• Your dog chews up your sorel boots, still milking that "Oh, but I'm still upset over being attacked" excuse.

I so hate Mondays.

* Maddy's fine, by the way.

Some pictures from the weekend

Before I delve into something deeper, I'm starting out small with my winter reading curriculum. I started in on The Saint Paul Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald yesterday. Apparently Scottie had lots of nostalgia for his home town, but wasn't absolutely in love with the place. As he in a letter to his friend, "St. Paul is as dull as hell" before signing the letter "Yours in this hell-hole of life + time". Still, I think F. Scott's the only major American author to write a story about the Minnesota State Fair (in A Night At The Fair).

From the "Don't leave home without 'em" file: Road Rage Cards and Dear Cell Phone User cards.

Slingshot Santa!

McSweeney's: In the Locker Room at Halftime.

Best Buy's got spirit, yes they do, Best Buy's got spirit, how 'bout YOU?

I have seen the future of advertising, and it is good. Best Buy has got yet another bizarre site called Pump Up The Movie, this time as a weird cheerleading spoof. Does their creative staff just sit around and lick toads all day or what? I don't know, but it keeps me amused. I just might have to practice my "Smell the milk carton" cheer and "Wristband Dance" for happy hour tonight...

Go Hummingbirds!

Using Product Placement In Your Serial Killer Script.

Awesome list: Top 100 Overlooked Films of the 1990s. Bottle Rocket should have been placed MUCH higher on the list, but at least it's on there.

Code Red. Ashcroft's album alert. Now, where'd I stash all my duct tape?

It's still just a concept vehicle, but if this were on the market I'd go out and buy one today. I sooooo want one of these. I'd get the wood-paneled model.

Oops, she did it again

Lily climbed another tree yesterday (by the way, I'm holding the camera phone over my head, so you know that's at least 5 feet off the ground from this perspective)... This time she didn't fall out.



Actually, Lily's a rescue dog, so she's not pure tree-climbing coonhound. The best we can guess is that she's a mix between a pointer and coonhound. She's a climber, though.

Oh, and Anne #1 got me a clicker to help train Maddy. Not that it helps, but it's still pretty cool. I'm supposed to "click" whenever Maddy does something "good" -- as kind of a positive reinforcement association type of thing. Of course, it's much more fun to dance a little jig with my feet and use the clicker to make tap dance sounds, because then Maddy thinks I'm like Sammy Davis, Jr. or something.

Now that we're heading into the "reading season", I'm looking for a new book to dig into. Something like classic -- like the type of book you really should read sometime in your life. Any ideas? I'm open to suggestions...

Here Comes A Regular

Like that dude said a couple of Sundays ago, "Church? The dog park IS my church?". I think I've mentioned this before, but there's a regular crew that goes up to the dog park every day. And it's fair to say that, now, I'm a regular. When we come in we're greeted by a chorus of 'Madddddy's. Only a couple of people even know my real name. To everyone else, I'm Maddy's Daddy, or, thanks to my penchance for overdressing, I'm sometimes "The Michelin Man" or "Ralphie's Brother".



The dog park visit has become my daily coffee break, my time out of the house, so I've come to look forward to it. One of the things I miss most about regular work is that I don't have any of that normal co-worker chat time anymore. That water-cooler, "Didja see The Bachelor last night? What was he THINKING?..." kind of talk. The dog park fills that gap, especially with the regulars.

Dogs are pack animals, and I guess most of us people are too. Maddy and I go mid-morning, so that's when I meet the pack. Hardly anyone has a regular 9-to-5 job; we are the jazz singer, the cellist, the tattoo artist, the graveyard-shift workers, the grandpa, and The Annes.

I think The Annes are my favorite. Normally, it's just Anne #1, who's like my regular dog-walking buddy, but sometimes her partner Anne #2 comes along as well, mostly on weekends.

The reason I hang around with Anne #1 so much is that Maddy is totally in love with her. I swear. Maddy's favorite people are, in order: 1) My Mom, 2) Anne #1, 3) that fat Wilford Brimley antisocial bastard who only throws balls to his dog and ignores everyone else in the park (a regular), and 4) that Steve Buscemi look-alike idiot who shows me parts from his snowblower carburetor which he conveniently totes around in his pocket (another regular). I'm somewhere on the list at about 9 or 10.

The Annes and I are hound people. They have a tree-climbing coon hound named Lily. If you've never seen a tree-climing coon hound, they're amazing creatures. True to their name, they climb trees. Like seriously climb trees. On Sunday, for instance, I'm hanging out with Anne #1 when both Maddy and Lily manage to tree a squirrel. While Maddy just bayed at the base of the tree, Lily took matters into her own paws and whooosh, up the tree she went. She got up about 15 feet up; Anne #1 and myself looked at each other and sighed. Lily's good at climbing up, but climbing down? Eh, not so good. So after much coaxing, poor Lily fell out of the tree. Ouch! She limped a little, but I think she was more disappointed not to catch the squirrel. So it goes when you're a tree-climbing coon hound.

So yesterday, I was asking Anne #1 if Lily was okay after her fall. She was, evidenced by the 30 mph run-by just at that moment. Anne #1 told me how they went out to the country in the afternoon to take photographs, and Lily was bounding about amidst acres and acres of prairie, back to her normal self. She had mentioned this (the photography) before, so I asked if she was a photographer. "Yeah, well, sort of." As it turns out, Anne #2 is the professional photographer. Anne #1 is a filmmaker.

A filmmaker? At the dog park?

The rest of the conversation was about film, and movies, and the local "scene". I guess she's mostly worked out in Boston and Florida, so she's not that connected with the local filmmaking crowd too much. She focuses mostly on shorts -- narrative fiction -- and has been doing the festival circuit for a while. Soon she'll be going down to Florida to screen one of her films. I'm not exactly sure what her work is like, but she mentioned she's getting a stipend to fly down for the film festival. This much I know. Nobody pays to fly in a crappy filmmaker, so I'll bet she's pretty good.

According to her, she's trying to do more networking around here, so I suggested that she try showing one of her films over at the Bryant Lake Bowl, just to get to have fun and schmooze a bit. She's pondering the idea, and I've got my fingers crossed. I also volunteered my expert services as "coffee getter/gaffer/best boy/grip" if she's shooting anything locally any time soon. I'll even give her my idea for a short, "The World's Worst Seeing-Eye Dog", where I envision a serious of Chaplinesque moments of Maddy leading me into trees, signposts, and dangerously thick traffic.

Anyway, I'm just thrilled to have some other connection with my dog-walking buddy. Now, we can talk about stuff other than kibbles and other assorted bits. "Ya know, the fascinating thing about Cassavetes is... Whoa, what have you been feeding Lily? That's one massive dump... Um, so where was I? Oh yeah, Cassavetes..."

And, just when I'm all excited about the world of film, I get home only to receive a giddy e-mail from a friend of mine, sucking the air out of my lungs. Wouldn't you know it? He's Just Not That Into You is being turned into a movie. I sure hope Ashton Kutcher gets the lead. Bah.

And finally, The 10 Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time.

Some Friday time-wasters:

And starring Don Knotts as... The Dubya. (Watch this. It's good).

Anime Popeye.

McSweeney's: Obscure Chinese Proverbs and Develop Your Lateral Thinking.

New David Sedaris story in The New Yorker.

Extreme Accounting.

A letter to Santa Claus (by 6-year-old me)

This puzzles me. I mean, really. Why ON EARTH would a 6-year-old boy want a Magic 8-ball for Christmas? No Tonka trucks, or GI Joes, or footballs, or nerf guns. A Magic 8-ball? What questions could I possibly have had that required me to harness the divine mystical intervention of the Magic 8-ball? Are we there yet? Ask again later. Are we there yet? Ask again later. Are we there yet? All signs point to yes.

Yeahhhh! We’re THERE!

And on a related note, here’s one thing that I’m curious about. At what point does being “obsessive-compulsive” become a “disorder”. I think I’ve always been a little bit OC, but I don’t think I have a disorder. I suppose washing your hands every 15 minutes until their bloody – sure, that’s a disorder. But what about just little stuff (like going to the State Fair 60 days in a row)? Is that really a disorder?

So, I'm terming my condition as OCFT (Obsessive-Compulsive Fun Time).

Here’s an example: I just finished reading Running With Scissors by Augusten Burroughs, and he relates a story about how his adoptive sister used to “Bible Dip”. It’s sort of like the Magic 8-ball. You ask a question, then open the bible up to a random page and point at a word. Whatever that word is, it's a clue to the answer.

I’ve tried my own variation of this game, only I call it iPod-skipping. You ask a question to your iPod (makes sure it’s on shuffle play), and then wait for the next song. THAT will be your clue. Only, it doesn’t work so well. For example, he’s what happens:

O’ magic iPod, will I meet some fantastically gorgeous super-model type up at the dog park today?

{skip}

Should I Stay or Should I Go? (by the clash): Um. That’s answering a question with a question. Actually, with two other questions. And all this song really says is that there will either be trouble (not so good), or perhaps there will be double (even worse). This isn’t helping me much.

{skip}

Androgynous (by The Replacements): Yecch. Don’t even want to know what that means.

{skip}

Road to Nowhere (by The Talking Heads): What? I don't like this answer. I'm trying again.

{skip}

Der Kommisar (by Falco): Great. This stupid song’s in German. NEXT…

{skip}

Dancing With Myself (by Billy Idol)

Oh, ha ha ha. Very funny, magic iPod. Bah!

And the really dumb thing is, I'll probably continue playing this little game over and over and over. All signs point to yes.

The New USA

Cool. I live in Miniwillinois...

The Goof, The Bad, and the Ugly. Meet El Presidente of the United State of Texas.

Tom Ridge resigns as Homeland Security Secretary. I have just one question? Tom, what color is your parachute?

And continuing the theme of "I can't believe I live in a country this stupid"... Here's a fine bit of irony. Step one: Hold congressional hearings to listen to complaints by the National Institute for Media and the Family about obscenity in video games. Step two: Show explicit video clips ala 'Girls Gone Wild' to dorky senators like Joe Lieberman. Step three: Broadcast the whole damn thing, boobies and all, on C-SPAN!

Now, if the FCC can fine stations for showing a 1/10th second clip of Janet Jackson's nipple, I say they bring down the hammer on those bastards over at C-SPAN. The horror, the horror...

The next time you start bitching about how expensive gasoline is, consider this.

'12 Days of Christmas' gifts would cost $66,000, firm estimates. The nine ladies dancing would leave the largest dent in your wallet this year - coming in at $4,400. Wow! I hope that includes the lapdances...

discover what candy you are @ quiz me