Since it's Friday night...

...some feminine pulchritude is in order, so here's Kelly Hu, looking, um casual:

I'd tell you not to put your feet up on the desk, but, well, who am I kidding?

The other white meat blue pill

At the risk of offending any Jews, Muslims, or vegans who are reading this, there's nothing quite so heavenly as some perfectly-grilled baby back ribs or a few pieces of wonderfully pan-sizzled strips of bacon (okay, I was just kidding about offending the vegans) but pork products don't exactly make me feel, um, like this...

Argentina's president recommended pork as an alternative to Viagra Wednesday, saying she spent a satisfying weekend with her husband after eating barbecued pork.

Hey, that's amazing! And what kind of audience was she addressing? Psychotherapists who deal with sexual dysfunction issues? Chemists who work on erectile dysfunction drugs? Er, not exactly...

"I've just been told something I didn't know; that eating pork improves your sex life ... I'd say it's a lot nicer to eat a bit of grilled pork than take Viagra," President Cristina Fernandez said to leaders of the pig farming industry.

I'm sure that the fact that she was talking to people from the pig farming industry didn't influence her remarks at all.

PETArded in Pennsylvania

So, PETA wants the town of Punxsutawney to stop using actual groundhogs to predict the weather, and wrote town officials, claiming that doing so is cruel:

Gemma Vaughan, an Animals in Entertainment Specialist with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, wrote in the letter to the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club saying keeping Punxsutawney Phil on display year-round is a "cruel" way to treat the animal, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported Wednesday.

"Make the compassionate decision to use an animatronic Phil and retire the live groundhogs who are used for Groundhog Day activities to a sanctuary," Vaughan wrote. "Tradition is no excuse for cruelty."

So, someone picks him up once a year, determines whether or not he's supposedly seen his shadow, and he gets his picture taken by a bunch of reporters who would probably rather be somewhere else, and that's somehow animal cruelty?

Bill Deeley, the president of the town's Groundhog Club (which is likely the most powerful and influential Groundhog Club in the country) doesn't seem to think so...

"Phil is probably treated better than the average child in Pennsylvania," Deeley said. "He's got air conditioning in the summer, his pen is heated in winter...He has everything but a TV in there. What more do you want?"

The average kid in Pennsylvania doesn't have heating, air conditioning, or teevee? Damn, and here I thought California was a hellhole.

Headline of the day

Cops stop cyclist with butcher knife-pool cue axe

You'll be shocked, I'm sure to find out that they also found drug paraphernalia and prescription painkillers belonging to someone else on the fine, upstanding citizen who was riding around on a bike with a "butcher knife-pool cue axe."

Yeah.

Go to jail, go directly to jail...

...and, um, you probably don't want to try to break into jail:

At about 4:10 a.m., sheriff deputies at the jail spotted a man scrambling over a tall fence that surrounds a secure lot where arresting officers unload potential prisoners and escort them inside. Jail officials met the man on the ground and contacted Medford police.

The man, James Merrill DeVore, 28, told police that he was distraught over the death of his mother two years ago and admitted that he had been drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana. He told officers that he needed help, so he went to the jail to ask for assistance. When he didn't get an immediate answer at the front entrance, he decided to go around to the back.

Medford police charged him with disorderly conduct and trespassing.

The funniest part? His antics still didn't land him in jail. He ended up in a county "sobering center" and was referred to a local mental health program instead.

Well, I guess that isn't really "funny," per se. I hope he gets the help he needs.

(Okay, am I a bad person if I still think it's funny?)

Since it's Friday night...

...and today happens to be her birthday, here's a picture of Diane Lane:

She's got leeeeeegggggs...

Damnit, I missed it

Apparently, today was National Pie Day, and I didn't get any friggin' pie...

The American Pie Council says marking National Pie Day Thursday is a good way for folks to get back to one of the best simple pleasures of life.

Linda Hoskins, executive director of the Chicago association, said a good pie has long been a way for Americans to express their appreciation to friends, family members, neighbors and even members of the military serving their country.

"There's something touching about giving someone a gift as special as a pie," Hoskins said in a written statement. "If you were getting a gift, would you rather receive an ordinary tie, or an extraordinary pie?"

Personally, I'd prefer the pie, but you can't wear a pie to a job interview, can you? And in this economic climate, that seems a little more important.

Oh, wait, no...you could just take the pie to the interview, throw it at the boss, and hope that he's a fan of slapstick comedy. Yeah, that's a good idea.

The City That Never "Sleeps"

I guess that when you regulate prostitution, you get regulations like this:

Lodewijk Asscher, who faces re-election in March, said prostitution should be banned between 4 and 8 a.m. to complement existing efforts to fight crime, exploitation and human trafficking in Amsterdam's 800-year-old red light district.

"Only the biggest creeps and boozers are walking around at those hours," he said on Dutch radio. "Women really dread working then and sometimes the most vulnerable are used."

But the local union for prostitutes said it was against Asscher's proposal because the early morning hours are among the most lucrative for many women.

"This is not a good idea, this is the time when the prostitutes can make the most money," said Metje Blaak, a spokeswoman for the Rode Draad union for prostitutes.

I hesitate to wonder how you have to earn your dues to become a member of the Prostitutes' Union.

Throw the book at him!

Some crimes are so heinous that they almost leave me speechless. Case in point:

Police responding to a complaint of loud noise have cited a Fond du Lac man for "rocking out" to the music of John Denver. A police who responded to the man's apartment last week could hear Denver's music through the door. The officer pounded on the door but the man didn't answer. Finally the officer found out the man's name from a neighbor and called to him, bringing the man to the door.

When asked why he had the music so loud, the man said he was "rocking out."

What has our society come to when people think that you can rock out to John Denver? That's just sick. I blame those creeps who run the Easy Listening stations. Bastards.

I like a good piece of ham as much as the next guy...

...but this is ridiculous:

"Connoisseurs will appreciate the melt-in-the-mouth texture of this truly amazing Spanish ham," Cavanna said. "The leg may seem to have a large price tag but when you think about the amount of care taken from breeding right through to the curing, it is actually amazing value."

You're going to have to go ahead and click on the link to find out just how "amazing" a value this actually is.

(Hint: Not so much.)

Since you get the idea...

...here's Jennifer Connelley, wearing an old-skool costume...

Nice freckles. And, uh, nice other stuff, too.

Taxes really, really suck

I mean, they suck really hard. And...well, let's just leave it at that.

Srsly

Um, dude, your doin it rong:

A man who said he wanted to rob a FedEx Kinko's store Tuesday morning handed over a note and then waited outside for police to arrive, officers said.

Portland police officers were called to the FedEx store on Southwest Barbur and Terwiliger boulevards just before 9 a.m.

Paul Rhoney, an employee at the store, said officers showed up within six minutes after the man handed over the note.

According to Rhoney, the note said, "This is a robbery, I'll wait outside for police, sorry."

I don't know much about robbing a FedEx guy (or anybody else, for that matter) but, this seems like the wrong way to go about it.

Or was it? He may have had an ingenious plan...

Police identified the man as 46-year-old Thomas Decker.

Wheat said no robbery charges will be filed because Decker did not have a weapon and didn't carry out the robbery. Police believe he simply wanted to go to jail.

If you fail at going to jail on purpose, is there anything below that?

Oh, wait. Dude. When they don't take you to jail, they can't confiscate your shoelaces, can they?

Might I suggest a troll sanctuary?

This is an idea so asinine that it could only have come from the highly-educated idiots at my Alma Mater:

The architects behind a graduate school project to conceive uses for the eastern half of San Francisco's Bay Bridge say the idea driving the project is valid.

Frederic Schwartz, a New York architect who served as the Joseph Esherick visiting professor in architecture at the University of California Berkeley campus' College of Environmental Design, said the semester-long graduate project was based in the idea that the bridge should be converted to a useful structure rather than demolished after its scheduled replacement in 2013, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Tuesday.

"There's no reason it can't be transformed into something wondrous, a fusion of nature and the machine," Schwartz said.

The projects developed by the students include a working farm, a hotel and a park sitting atop housing units.

Yeah, those projects all sound great, but...

A) An expert for the California Department of Transportation goes on to note that the bridge is seismically obsolete, which doesn't make it the kind of place where I'd like to hold a picnic, much less vacation, much much much less where I'd like to live, considering that a huge earthquake could send me and all of my stuff tumbling into the San Francisco Bay.

and

B) The same expert goes on to note that the level of money that the state would have to spend on maintenance for a project like that would be "enormous," and we're...um...kinda, well...FUCKING BROKE!

You geniuses might want to put your minds to ways in which the state can sell the fucker for scrap or recycle it for new highway projects, instead of sitting around and doing circle-jerk brainstorming sessions like this.

He was found wearing a tattered pair of Bad Idea Jeans

See, this is pretty much why the words "pet" and "tiger" aren't generally used in the same sentence:

A Canadian man who kept exotic cats behind his farmhouse was mauled to death by his 650-pound pet tiger, police said on Monday.

Norman Buwalda, a 66-year-old collector of wild animals, was found dead in the tiger's pen on Sunday afternoon at the property in western Ontario,

"The owner of some exotic animals went out to feed the tiger which was in a cage or large pen and the animal attacked him and killed him," said Troy Carlson, a constable for the Ontario Provincial Police who attended to the incident.

He said Buwalda's family and officials of nearby Southwold township would decide what to do with the tiger.

I'm guessing that hitting it on the snout with a rolled-up newspaper and yelling "BAD TIGER!" isn't an option. At least I hope not.

Since it's Friday night...

...and blah, blah, blah, so here's Jessica Simpson in a rather patriotic ensemble...

See, it's like the peace symbol button and "Born To Kill" on Private Joker's uniform in "Full Metal Jacket." Except Private Joker didn't have nice tits.

The fast and the furious

Everybody hates getting a speeding ticket, but probably not nearly as much as this guy:

A Swiss court has fined a multimillionaire a record $290,000 for speeding through a village at 85 mph in his red Ferrari Testarossa, news outlets in Switzerland report.

The fine is based on the unidentified speeder's wealth and his previous fast offenses. Swiss voters approved a penalty system that replaces prison for such crimes as speeding with "day fines" based on wealth — in this case $22.7 million.

[...]

Swiss news media reported that the man owns a villa with five luxury cars, including the Ferrari.

Yeah, well I guess it sure sucks to be him, huh?

No shirt, no shoes, no rampages

Sometimes, it's best to just go along with store policy. This would be one of those times:

Kansas City police said the woman, whose actions were caught on camera Dec. 27, complained about her hamburger and became angry when workers told her they could make a new sandwich but not give a cash refund, The Kansas City (Mo.) Star reported Wednesday.

Police said the woman broke a glass water dispenser by throwing it over the counter and shoved three cash registers from a counter, destroying a touch screen.

The cops haven't found her yet, but it should be hilarious when they do. They can ask if she wants fries or her right to remain silent with that.

Jeepers creepers!

With plenty of emphasis on the creepers part:

Ophthalmologists at St. James's University Hospital in Leeds, England, used high magnification lenses to find out what made the man's eye red, watery and light-sensitive, according to a study reported in the British medical journal The Lancet on Thursday.

They discovered hair-like projections stuck in the man's cornea.

It was a light bulb moment for the patient, who remembered that three weeks earlier he had been cleaning a stubborn stain on the glass tank of his pet, a Chilean Rose tarantula.

"He sensed movement in the terrarium. He turned his head and found that the tarantula, which was in close proximity, had released 'a mist of hairs' which hit his eyes and face," the doctors wrote.

They said the man's condition was rare.

I should hope so. Getting sprayed in the eyes with tarantula hairs shouldn't be something that happens every day. Not outside of remote parts of the jungle, anyway. And, really, even there, that should only happen every other week or so.

RIP

Angels broadcaster Rory Markas passed away last night. He was only 54.

Nice work if you can get it

This was a contest? Really?

A New York man said he plans to distribute most of his winnings from spending 48 hours in a recliner at a restaurant to his friends and family.

Champion couch potato Jorge Cruz, 26, sat and snacked in a recliner at the ESPN Zone in Times Square for two full days, beating the previous record for the annual event by 19 hours, the New York Daily News reported Monday.

Cruz and his three opponents in the competition sat down at 11 a.m. on New Year's Day and were allowed hourly stretches with bathroom breaks occurring once every 8 hours.

"They'll bring me free food to sit here and watch sports? I thought, 'Sounds like a win-win,'" Cruz said. "I come here all the time anyway."

I thought you had to run a certain distance, smoke a bunch of cigarettes at once, eat a record number of hot dogs, or finish a bunch of beers without passing out or puking in order to win stuff. Or all of those combined.

If I had known that sitting around and doing nothing was good enough, well, I still probably wouldn't have done anything.

I'm a lazy, lazy man. Seriously, if I wasn't so lazy, I could have found out about this "contest."

Since it's New Year's Day...

...yeah, whatever, here's some Catherine Zeta-Jones side-boob...

Michael Douglas sure is a lucky sonofabitch.