Friday, December 31, 2010

Since it's New Year's Eve...

...and it's also Friday night, here's a pic of Scarlett Johansson celebrating both with a bottle of Champagne...


This is actually from an ad for a famous French sparkling wine. An ad which mainly implies that Ms. Johansson can afford to spill French sparkling wine all over because of her great wealth and celebrity status, I presume. Mainly.

I hope everyone has a safe and happy New Year's Eve. I tend to stick close to home on this particular holiday because of the number of drunk drivers out on the roads/DUI checkpoints. I don't like those odds.

Thursday, December 30, 2010

I may not be a lawyer...

...but I'm pretty sure that this defense isn't going to hold up in court:
An Ohio drunken-driving suspect is blaming his arrest on Ozzy Osbourne. William Liston was arrested Christmas Eve in suburban Cleveland. WJW-TV says he told police officers, "Ozzy Osbourne and his music made me do it."
I mean, unless he can somehow get Ozzy to appear in court and testify that, indeed, his music was specifically written and performed to compel William Liston of Ohio to drive drunk, that is. That would be pretty compelling.

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Arbitrary milestone reached

Sometime over the past few days, this here little crapblog reached 50,000 hits. That doesn't really mean anything, at least in terms of the real world, but that's half a million or so people who have read my crappy jokes, right?.

I mean, I told myself there would be no math here. And I run this place, so shut up.

Oh, also, thank you for showing up here for whatever reason.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Remind me again why everyone hates lawyers...

Oh, right, it's because of stuff like this:
Gene Gulinson, who practices [law] in Phoenix, said his treatment at the Highland Justice Court in Gilbert damaged his reputation, The Arizona Republic reported. He is seeking $75,000 from the town.
And what indignity did Mr. Gulinson suffer there? Was he dragged out of court by a bailiff on the orders of some pompous judge? Pepper sprayed by an abusive guard? Subjected to a humiliating strip search?

Er, not exactly...
The trouble began when Gulinson went to the courthouse for a pretrial conference with a client who had two traffic tickets. He said guards first told him he could not enter carrying a bag of pastries a client had given him.

After he got rid of the pastries, guards searched his briefcase and found the jawbreakers.
That's right, they confiscated his sweets. This is truly (not) the human rights outrage of the decade!!!

Monday, December 27, 2010

Please stop truckin'

The lesson I got from this roundup of news from the Sunshine State is that if you're ever down there and you meet someone with a pickup truck, you should just back away slowly:
In other truck news, a death row inmate filed and lost a lawsuit seeking to keep a restored 1971 Chevy pickup that he stole from the couple he killed.

In Sanford, a dealer of used pickup trucks offered a free AK-47 assault rifle with every purchase. Apparently trucks and guns go well together. Fort Pierce police say a 25-year-old man drove his pickup truck across a lawn, over a mailbox and at several people after losing an arm-wrestling match, then pressed a rifle to the forehead of the man who beat him. Two men were charged in Glades County after authorities found 36 dead alligators and 19 live hatchlings in their pickup truck.
Well, I'm sure they had a reasonable explanation. And I'm sure there are also plenty of gun-toting, alligator-hoarding nutjobs down there who drive sedans, sports cars, and vans, too.

Especially vans.

Friday, December 24, 2010

Since it's Xmas Eve...

...and it's also a Friday night, here's a pic of Futurama's Amy Wong in some festive holiday garb:

No, I really don't know why she has a sword. The future is apparently complicated.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Wedding China

If you can't wait for the pirated DVD of the upcoming royal wedding, relax--you can buy some other cheap commemorative junk:
Chinese vendors looking to cash in on the frenzy over the April wedding of Britain's Prince William and Kate Middleton are selling copies of her engagement ring for as little as three dollars.

Knock-offs of the 45,000-dollar sapphire-and-diamond ring that the prince gave to Middleton -- and once worn by his mother, Princess Diana -- are on offer at various shops on Taobao.com, China's largest online mall.

Most are selling for less than 100 yuan (15 dollars), with the cheapest -- allegedly made of zircon and unspecified alloys -- available for just 19.9 yuan, or about three dollars, according to Taobao pages searched by AFP.
What do you want to bet that the "unspecified alloys" include frightfully lethal amounts of lead?

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Next time, you might want to call an exterminator

The independent can-do spirit of this country is admirable in a lot of ways, but there are some problems you should leave to the professionals. Especially those that involve swarms of stinging insects and fire within your home:
Capt. Don DeLucia, spokesman for Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue, said Mario Go of Lake Worth was trying to smoke the bees out of a column supporting a second-story balcony Tuesday and accidentally set the house on fire, The Palm Beach Post reported Wednesday.

The damage to his property is estimated at $50,000. Oh, and the kicker?
[DeLucia] said the fire also failed to drive away the bees.

I don't think bees understand the concept of humor, but if they do, they're laughing their stingers off. Which, in a further ironic twist, would kill them.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Okay, there are a couple of problems here

No, I don't mean with the idea of putting reflectors on animals in a region where it's dark all day:
Norwegian reindeer owners have a Christmas safety tip for Santa -- put reflectors on his fleet-footed animals so they won't get hit by cars.

About 2,000 reindeer have been fitted this month with reflective yellow collars or small antler tags to cut down on the car crashes that now kill 500 reindeer a year and pose a danger to motorists across Arctic Norway.

"It really works," Kristian Oevernes, the leader of the project at the Norwegian Public Roads Administration, told Reuters of the project in Finnmark, where the sun does not rise in mid-winter.
The problem here is that this would be good advice for Santa Claus if he used the roads that the rest of us travel on, but he has a fleet of magical, flying reindeer. Hell, he even parks them on the roof while he's breaking into your house. If you crash into Santa's sleigh, it's really your problem, not his.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Toys don't pay for themselves

It looks like the recession has hit everybody pretty hard--even mystical beings:
Police say a man dressed as Santa Claus has robbed a Rhode Island yacht club.

Authorities say a bartender was alone in the East Providence Yacht Club Sunday night when a large man wearing a red suit, red hat, white beard and carrying a sack walked into the bar and brandished a gun.

The bartender fled and ran to a nearby business where she called 911.

[...]

There were no immediate arrests.
They should check the chimney.

I mean, If he managed to climb out of the chimney, there may be fingerprints. And if he got stuck somewhere inside the chimney, they'll find, um, some other evidence up there.

Yeah, Gremlins.

Friday, December 17, 2010

Since it's Friday night...

...and we like to gaze at attractive women during this time of the week, here's a pic of actress Amy Acker (try saying that five times fast!):
I said it five times fast! What do I get? Oh, a restraining order. Great.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

It's called a belt

Again, it's called a belt:
A New York man said he has invented the perfect fashion accessory designed to keep low-riding pants sagging at just the right level.
Seriously, it's a belt. It's been sold in almost every store in this country in which pants have also been sold for at least the last century.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

It's crazy, what turns up in the couch cushions

I mean, something goes missing for a while, and then it just turns up:
A team of scientists say they have positively identified an embalmed head, presumed lost in the chaos of the French Revolution, as that of King Henri IV of France who was assassinated in 1610.

The head was apparently lost after revolutionaries desecrated the graves of French kings in the royal basilica of Saint-Denis near Paris in 1793.

Few remains of those bodies have ever been found and positively identified since.

But a team of experts using advanced scientific techniques say they have conclusively identified the head, passed down over the centuries by private collectors, as that of the monarch.
You know, I kind of think that the fact that they've identified a number of the kind of people who collect severed heads is the more important thing here, but that's just me.

Monday, December 13, 2010

If I ever get sent to jail...

...I've decided that I'll be invoking The Great Pumpkin to get out of something or other:
The Orange County Register reported Monday that Malcolm Alarmo King disliked the salami meals served at the jail, so he used his devotion to Festivus as a reason to get kosher meals reserved for inmates with religious needs.

Keeping kosher is not one of the tenets of Festivus, which was depicted on "Seinfeld" as celebrated with the airing of grievances and the display of an aluminum pole.
The article does not go on to state whether or not he was provided with an aluminum pole, though I kind of doubt it. On the other hand, in a setting like jail, I'm sure that "airing of grievances" is a year-round kind of thing.

Friday, December 10, 2010

Since it's Friday night...

...and it wouldn't be Friday night around here without a sexy dame, here's Sports Illustrated swimsuit model Jessica Gomes, hanging out with a dolphin:

Is it just me, or is Flipper smirking at us?

Thursday, December 09, 2010

The cards that pay you back

So, there's this woman named Jill-Anne (no last name given) who designs greeting cards and sells them out of her own store in New York, and whenever someone buys fifty bucks worth of stuff, she'll perform an in-store pole dance for them. Needless to say, I'm cool with that. But I noticed this at the end of the article:
"Seventy-five percent of the people, when I'm poling, in my store who walk by are women who smile and clap, so it's not a male lust thing. It's empowering women thing as well," Jill-Anne said.
Yeah, it's nice that a lot of ladies smile and clap when they walk by and see you "poling," but I can't help but notice that you didn't mention how many of them are actually, you know, coming in and spending fifty bucks inside your store.

Still, it's cool that you've found something that works for you in this tough economy. I don't think your business model would work for the kind of frumpy old ladies who work at my local Hallmark store, even if they were able to do a pole dance.

Wednesday, December 08, 2010

It's a small world after all

Gosh, it's like these two were made to be together...
A motorist caught speeding in London two years ago moved to New Zealand only to be booked by the same police officer for again exceeding the limit, reports said Wednesday.

Former London bobby Andy Flitton ticketed the man in Britain two years ago, shortly before migrating to New Zealand -- then caught him again in September on a highway in the South Island, the New Zealand Herald reported.
The lesson here is that God doesn't want us to live on islands. The UK? A bunch of islands. New Zealand? Also islands. There are fewer miles of roads on islands, so the cops have more speed traps per capita, right?

Continents are the way to go, people.

Tuesday, December 07, 2010

Love bites

I've never been married, but I've been to a few weddings, and "Love, honor, and cherish" are common things I've heard in the vows. "Chomp," on the other hand...
A Wisconsin woman bit off half her husband's tongue during a kiss and has been arrested, authorities said on Tuesday.

The bitten piece of the husband's tongue was recovered, and he was taken to a hospital following the incident late on Monday, Sheboygan, Wisconsin police said in a statement.

The woman, 57, told emergency workers she had "bit her husband's tongue off," police said in a statement. She had blood on her clothing, they said.

The 79-year-old victim said his wife bit his tongue while he was kissing her, police said.
Um, the victim "said" that his wife did that? I'm surprised that the cops understood him.

Monday, December 06, 2010

Have a very merry minimalist Christmas

Now, this is just some lazy-ass bullshit right here:
The artist behind this year's Christmas tree at the Tate Britain gallery in London said he left the tree bare to show how it is "naturally beautiful."

Artist Giorgio Sadotti said he decided to leave the Norwegian spruce undecorated, save for mirrored silver cards promoting a Jan. 6 concert at its base, The Daily Telegraph reported Monday.

"I am showing what I believe to be a naturally beautiful object," Sadotti said. "When you see a tree in the forest you don't think 'that tree's naked, it needs a bit of tinsel.'"
No, you don't think anything like that, because what you're looking at there is just an ordinary tree growing in a forest, not one which a prestigious museum had shipped in and then hired you, an artist, to decorate for Christmas. You know, with decorations.

I don't know if this Sadotti guy has kids, but I'd hate to be one of them on Christmas morning.

"When you see a tree in the forest, kids, you don't expect to find gift-wrapped toys underneath it, right? Right? Why are you looking at me like that?"

Friday, December 03, 2010

Since it's Friday night...

...and we're about to be swamped with red and green, here's British actress Billie Piper doing something with a pink and white theme:



There's probably some symbolism going on there, if you look at it in context, but I don't really care.

Thursday, December 02, 2010

Snip, snip, CRASH! Snip, snip...

Damn, this guy had better get some kind of award from the local Chamber of Commerce:
An SUV crashed into an Anchorage barber shop, narrowly missing shop owner Heng Song and his two customers.

But Song wasn't about to let the horrifying moment get in the way of a good haircut.

He was momentarily stunned, yes, when the vehicle burst through a door and window Wednesday afternoon as he was clipping a customer's hair.

"Half a haircut and kaboom!" is how the 53-year-old native of South Korea described it Thursday, after the shop had been cleared of debris and the gaping hole was boarded with plywood.

[...]

Song laughed Thursday as the footage showed him soon return to the chair and continue the haircut, while in the background bystanders began to gather. There's no way he would let a loyal customer go home with a botched job, Song said.

Leaving a customer with half a haircut, he said, would be "something too ugly."

On top of that, Song gave both customers haircuts on the house. He said it's the least he could do after the ordeal.
The police then had him tested for drugs, because, seriously, nobody is that good-natured.

I think it's awesome that that he finished the haircuts and all, but I'm not sure I'd necessarily want someone handling scissors around my head after something quite that jarring.

Wednesday, December 01, 2010

I know what I don't want for Christmas

Well, there are lots of things I don't want, but I specifically would prefer not to find this under the tree:
A Los Angeles auction house said on Tuesday it would sell the simple pine coffin in which the suspected assassin of President John F. Kennedy was buried for almost 20 years.

Bidding will start at $1,000, but the item is expected to fetch strong interest from museums and collectors of presidential memorabilia when it goes on the block on December 16.
No, the coffin doesn't contain Lee Harvey Oswald's remains, either, though I can't really say that the inclusion of his corpse would make this a more attractive gift idea.

(Seriously, I'm more of a McKinley assassination buff. If Leon Czolgosz's coffin becomes available, that would make a great stocking stuffer.)